Blindsight

Aug 07, 2012 mark monday rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: new-dimensions, futuristik

what is Consciousness? how did the silly human race evolve beyond the herd instinct, beyond our reptile brain? how, and why? what is the purpose of our individuality, what is the need for our sense of self, what use is Human Connection, why are we even equipped with Empathy? for some naive, kinda-sorta spiritual folks (like myself), these things may explain the existence of God. but that's rather besides the point of the question. does empathy help us in the long run, does the ability of humans...more what is Consciousness? how did the silly human race evolve beyond the herd instinct, beyond our reptile brain? how, and why? what is the purpose of our individuality, what is the need for our sense of self, what use is Human Connection, why are we even equipped with Empathy? for some naive, kinda-sorta spiritual folks (like myself), these things may explain the existence of God. but that's rather besides the point of the question. does empathy help us in the long run, does the ability of humans to connect with each other truly offer anything besides constant discomfort and potential danger? is a psychopath who does not experience empathy somehow less than human? how would a highly developed species that has somehow evolved without empathy or individuality react to a species like ours - one that is contantly talking to itself, connecting, empathizing, exploring, throwing itself and its messages out into the void, to seek, to find, to understand, to know?

exploring all of those questions is the purpose of Peter Watts' superb Blindsight. the novel is about one of those Ambiguous Threats Appearing in the Outskirts of Known Space. future Earth is a fucked-up Earth, no surprise there. humans regularly 'ascend' into a fake-sounding cyberheaven. vampires - apparently an extremely predatory offshoot of the homo sapien, complete with an anti-Euclidean mental bias that explains their phobia of crosses - have been revived and now serve the human race (the inclusion of vampires may sound cheesy, but believe me, it is one of more absorbing things about the novel). there is some deadly construct called the Icarus Array located somewhere near the sun, stationed there to "protect" us. sex is an outdated activity (perhaps the sole unconvincing part of the novel). genuine human contact rarely takes place face-to-face. your usual Cold Techno-Dystopia. the Ambiguous Threat is noted shortly after a startling "Firefly" effect occurs over the earth - an effect that appears to be the Ambiguous Threat's way of taking long-distance pictures of human shenanigans.

so the silly humans decide to fling a crew of misfits out into the void to engage with said Ambiguous Threat. there's a woman who has compartmentalized herself into 4 different and distinctly individualistic personalities. there's a military type armed with slaved drones whose biggest flaw/greatest attribute is her ability to empathize with her enemies. there are a couple guys who project their consciousness through machinery, all inputs mediated by that machinery - all the better to study the world around them. there is the ship's captain, a sociopathic vampire mentally bonded to his ship's computer brain. and then there is our hero - a sort of minister of information, missing half a brain, trained to avoid all forms of true connection, unwilling to engage in basic empathy. this fascinating crew finds much to be fascinated with when confronting the Ambiguous Threat. for one, a spaceship that looks like it's from Dante's Inferno. aliens from, well, the Alien films, with some upsetting Predator type invisibility to boot. hallucinations and corresonding loss of self within those hallucinations. strange communications that sound full of villainous bravado - except those communications feel oversimplified, threatening in the most obvious of ways, purposely dumbed-down...to what end? the Ambiguous Threat appears capable of automatically healing its own hull, controlling thousands of asteroids at once, and harnessing the power of a gas giant... yet seems oddly powerless, even uncaring. things don't add up. despite all the crew sees and analyzes, the Ambiguous Threat has a rather terrifying lack of signifiers.

the author is clearly a highly intelligent sort, PhD and everything, and the novel is full of Exra Hard Science Action. but i think folks are really mislabeling Blindsight if they consider it to be genuine Hard Science Fiction. to put it in the corniest of terms: this is a novel about the human condition. look at the dystopic details of this future Earth, review the cast of characters... Blindsight is built on examining all of the different options for humans and nonhumans to connect or not to connect, all the ways that individuals can reach across their individual sense of self to connect with another person's reality. the nature of the Ambiguous Threat and the root of our protagonist's problems are disconcertingly connected: a rejection of individuality; an inability to connect with others. the novel is elegantly constructed so that form follows meaning rather than narrative. this may be frustrating to folks who eschew literary novels in favor of genre fiction. that's understandable... "narrative tension" is definitely lost by the constant switching back and forth between parallel storylines. on the one hand, the protagonist's past life of non-communication and deliberate avoidance of empathy (shades of Dying Inside); on the other hand, the mission into the void (which itself is rife with pointed character flashblacks). but for Watts to have structured Blindsight in any other way would have been to lose the point of it all. the novel is not really about a dark space adventure. it is about the importance of empathetic connection, its value and its dangers, how it condemns us with one hand and lifts us up to a higher place with the other.

oh, and one last thing... if that last sentence makes you think that this is one of those enriching spiritual journey type of books, think again. this awesome novel is about as bleak and pessimistic as they come. an important warning to keep in mind before approaching: this dog bites!(less)

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Apr 05, 2013 Terry rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: sci-fi, canadian, horror

Wow. This was a tough one. It was a very good hard sf book that I don't think I'll be coming back to anytime soon. As others have said: "abandon all hope ye who enter here." A well written, excruciating exploration of the human "problem" where it turns out that it really is a problem. How do you take a book whose central premise seems to be that the development of self-awareness in human evolution was a wrong turn that wasn't meant to happen at all? That it was in fact contrary to the entire dev...more Wow. This was a tough one. It was a very good hard sf book that I don't think I'll be coming back to anytime soon. As others have said: "abandon all hope ye who enter here." A well written, excruciating exploration of the human "problem" where it turns out that it really is a problem. How do you take a book whose central premise seems to be that the development of self-awareness in human evolution was a wrong turn that wasn't meant to happen at all? That it was in fact contrary to the entire development of intelligence throughout the rest of the universe that only occurred due to a fluke in the evolution of a competing species? Talk about being alone in an uncaring reality. Watts manages to take Lovecraft's primary hobby horse and make it work in a way that is truly frightening in its utter nihilism. This isn't a scary universe because Watts tells us so (as it would have been had Lovecraft wrote the tale), it's scary because he shows us so.

Our primary filter for information is Siri Keeton, a man with literally only half a brain. Due to a childhood trauma he was essentially lobotomized and given computer processors to make up for what was removed. Siri obviously lost a lot during the process, but "gained" the ability to be the ultimate "Chinese Room" for humanity...for all that was worth. His whole life he has been trying to understand even 'baseline' humans and his facility with doing so, with looking at the human enigma on the surface and from the outside, and parsing it correctly has led him to become a professional conduit between these baseline humans and the posthuman entities they have created and made to work for them. He is a uniquely appropriate narrator for this tale as his very mode of existence showcases Watts' entire argument in microcosm; and interestingly his entire development as a character is the reverse of the development of the story and even of the universe itself. Siri's story starts and ends as a very lonely one, but for very different reasons.

Another fascinating element of the tale is the fairly unique use of vampires as an off-shoot sub-species of humanity originally destroyed due to humanity's self-awareness and then brought back by high science to be our servants. These are probably the most frightening vampires I've yet come across in fiction, not only because of the pseudo-scientific "plausibility", but primarily because of what we eventually discover about them in the story's conclusion.

I will say very little about "Rorschach", the alien entity with whom humanity attempts to communicate in this tale of first contact, except to say that the Lovecraftian enigma of its seeming indifference to human existence is truly chilling in its implications. Far more than any dreaming Cthulhu, Rorschach is an entity whose strangeness is truly to be feared.

All in all this was a rewarding, though deeply uncomfortable, read.

Also posted on Shelf Inflicted (less)

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Feb 23, 2010 Greg rated it 5 of 5 stars

Recommended to Greg by: Raja

Shelves: speculative-fiction

You know you're in for trouble when the dedication of the book says:

"If we're not in pain, we're not alive."

One of the quotes before the novel starts is:

"you will die like a dog for no good reason"

And the quote that starts the first chapter is one by Ted Bundy!

But still, it's a sci-fi book about consciousness...how could I not love it?

-----------------------------------------

I've always loved Science Fiction, and not just because books about the future are inherently cool. The reason I've always...more

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Jan 23, 2013 Rob rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: self-styled xenobiologists

Shelves: science-fiction, first-contact, 2007, 100-paperbacks, 2013

...I absolutely tore through this book. An utterly fascinating read; well-done in both its science and its style. Watts makes some clever choices in structuring his narrator (and consequently, the narrative) without it coming across as a gimmick or some other bit of contrivance. So we have this faithful guide working in our favor and a good entry point for the story.

And then he slowly unfurls idea after idea that link together into a shillelagh to bash your brain in. At one moment near the end,...more

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Jun 25, 2012 Simeon rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: sci-fi

Why do putatively brilliant scientists insist on explaining simple shit to one another? Their sole purpose appears to be strolling out at key intervals of the story and expounding on pop science.

"Oh hi, did you know that according to Game Theory the most efficient cooperative strategy is reciprocal altruism?"

Game theory may not be common knowledge, but it's hardly arcane either. The UK actually has a TV show built around it.

Same goes for bleeding edge opinions on consciousness, neurology, lin...more

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Aug 23, 2008 Ben rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites, fiction, read-2008, science-fiction, cyberpunk, first-contact

This is a great science fiction book. Smart and entertaining with a great cast of characters. In my mind, this book ranks up there with the classics like Rendezvous with Rama, The Mote in God's Eye, and Gateway. Watts is incredible and is on his way to being one of the new great science fiction authors.

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Feb 04, 2013 Oscar rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: fans de la ciencia ficción hard

Shelves: míos, ciencia-ficción, cf-hard, futuro-cercano, terror, postcyberpunk, 5-estrellas, favorites

Póngase una buena cantidad de H.P. Lovecraft. A continuación, añádase un buen chorro de Alastair Reynolds, y una pizca de Greg Egan. Y como ingrediente secreto, un chorrito de H.R. Giger. Agítese bien y ya tenemos el resultado: 'Visión ciega', de Peter Watts. Sírvase con precaución, ya que este cocktail no es para cualquier paladar.

Esta es una novela de primer contacto, pero maneja ideas tan complejas y poco comunes, que la alejan de cualquier otra novela que haya tratado este tema anteriormente...more Póngase una buena cantidad de H.P. Lovecraft. A continuación, añádase un buen chorro de Alastair Reynolds, y una pizca de Greg Egan. Y como ingrediente secreto, un chorrito de H.R. Giger. Agítese bien y ya tenemos el resultado: 'Visión ciega', de Peter Watts. Sírvase con precaución, ya que este cocktail no es para cualquier paladar.

Esta es una novela de primer contacto, pero maneja ideas tan complejas y poco comunes, que la alejan de cualquier otra novela que haya tratado este tema anteriormente. Es oscura, muy oscura; está ambientada en una atmósfera sumamente claustrofóbica y temible.

Decir que es ciencia ficción hard es quedarse corto. De hecho, al final del libro hay un apéndice con cantidad de notas explicativas y bibliografía utilizadas por Watts durante la concepción de su obra.

Pequeña sinopsis: en el año 2082, aparecieron en el cielo más de 65.000 sondas que rodearon la Tierra por completo. Tras un destello, se desintegraron. El resultado: acababan de hacernos una foto. Era una prueba de la existencia de vida extraterrestre, pero ¿hostil o pacífica? Se decidió mandar una misión tripulada formada por: Jukka Sarasti, un vampiro y jefe de la misión (sí amigos, se han encontrado pruebas científicas de hace más de 500.000 años que atestiguan la existencia del Homo sapiens vampiris, una subespecie humana, que en la novela ha sido traída de nuevo a la vida genéticamente); Isaac Szpindel, biólogo, para estudiar a los alienígenas; Amanda Bates, mayor del ejército, por si hay que luchar; la Banda de los Cuatro, que posee cuatro personalidades diferentes al tener el cerebro dividido, especialista en lingüística, para hablar con ellos; y Siri Keeton, sinteticista o jergonauta, para observar, debido a su capacidad de análisis de subtextos y topologías.

El narrador y protagonista es Siri, a través del cual iremos conociendo los sucesos que están pasando; al mismo tiempo, irá recordando episodios de su pasado anteriores a la misión.

Hay partes verdaderamente escalofriantes y memorables, como el Big Ben, una masa joviana de magnitudes gigantescas, o la nave alienígena, de verdadera pesadilla.

Recomendaría este libro sólo a aquellos lectores con un cierto bagaje en el género de la ciencia ficción, en especial en la ciencia ficción hard, más dura, ya que, aunque no es una novela de Greg Egan, sí hay ciertos pasajes algo áridos para el neófito.(less)

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Jul 18, 2008 Kristjan rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Hard SF Fans

Recommended to Kristjan by: Ben Caldwell

Shelves: science-fiction, reviewed

I was really intrigued with this story. There was a lot of concepts that I enjoyed exploring, such as the idea of human consciousness being up loadable into a computer system (obviously separating our psychic nature from our biological machinery). This sets the stage for the author to present his ideas about the relationship between intelligence and consciousness (which I generally associate with defining individuality or ego) in a first contact story very similar to how Space Odyssey 2001 read...more

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Feb 23, 2013 Ric rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Reading Peter Watts is like reading a synopsis of the latest issue of PopSci. description His range of hard SF topics is so broad, moving easily through biochemistry, astrophysics, paleogenetics, linguistics, whatnot, that you almost need the latest SF lexicon to keep up. The mindset is something like: "Eschew the simple direct statement, find the closest sci-tech reference, no matter how obscure, and let the reader deal with it." For an SF geek, that's just, like, heaven on earth.

Blindsight is brimming wi

...more

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Jun 28, 2009 Richard rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Recommended to Richard by: Borderlands-Books.com

Shelves: scifi, bookclub, singularity, scifi-hardscience, scifi-alien-first-contact, scifi-dystopia, scifi-cognition, fantasy-vampires

Wow. Excellent review here (complete spoiler, though).

Blindsight is an excellent sci-fi novel on several fronts. We've got a meaty and complex apocalyptic aliens-arrive story; Watts somehow manages to make us care about his highly dysfunctional cast of post-human misfits, and then he comments both on the very deep philosophical issues of consciousness as well as indirectly on the problem of the Singularity.

Précis:

The moderately near future. Technology has fractured the nature of "humanity", leav

...more

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Jul 30, 2007 Wealhtheow rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: sci-fi

Really interesting, chock full of ideologies, debates, and fascinating new technologies. It's great scifi. The only problem is that I completely disagree with the main premise of the book, which turns out to be that sentience is in fact a *problem* rather than Our Specialness. It's a cool twist to the usual first contact with alien life scenario, but unfortunately it makes no sense to me. I just don't get it. Yeah, a consciousness means that you second guess decisions and are slower to make them...more

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Jul 31, 2007 Alex rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2007hugonominees

I'm still having a hard time figuring out what I think about this book. I don't believe that it is well written, but I also don't believe that it is a bad book. Let's start with the first one. I've had a brief note up here for a while about this book that pretty much defines why I don't think it's well written. Take a look at this quote:

"There have always been those tasked with the rotation of informational topologies, but throughout most of history they had little to do with increasing its clar...more I'm still having a hard time figuring out what I think about this book. I don't believe that it is well written, but I also don't believe that it is a bad book. Let's start with the first one. I've had a brief note up here for a while about this book that pretty much defines why I don't think it's well written. Take a look at this quote:

"There have always been those tasked with the rotation of informational topologies, but throughout most of history they had little to do with increasing its clarity."

Italics his. Oh, the irony of the italics. His problem is that he really relies on jargon an awful lot to make his descriptions, and for people who don't use that same terminology, it can be like slogging through mud to understand what he's saying. In the first third of the book, I thought this was going to be the worst of the nominees, just because I couldn't understand half of what he was saying. In the rest of the book, once he's done with setup and back story, it gets better. But it never fully goes away, and the fact that the setup and back story are so unreadable - and yet so important - is a pretty huge problem.

Now on to my second point. I believe this is actually a good book. The characters are distinct and interesting, the world he created is believable, even if the "vampire" concept is a little out there. But most importantly, he did science fiction with aliens and he did it right. This is something that he even cites in the acknowledgments, but when you're doing aliens, you need to make them unrecognizable. This is a huge challenge, but you have to conceive of a species that evolved in a completely different environment, coming up a completely different path and becoming something completely unlike humanity. Or anything else on Earth for that matter. Talking cats don't count.

His aliens are the most plausibly non-human I have ever seen. I'm giving this book it's score largely based on that. I want to give it four stars just because of that, but the poor writing and the fact that it feels a little unfinished at the end make it hard to do that. It has a great second act, one that doesn't quite live up to its potential for me, but a worthy hugo nominee all the same.

Even though I'm giving this book a lower score than the others, this may be the winner in my opinion. The aliens may not make it rise above other books in terms of the writing, but in a science fiction contest, I believe they do.

NOTE: After reading Glasshouse, my personal award goes to that novel and not this one. Stross managed to do everything right in that one.

(less)

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Jun 04, 2007 Jenne rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Okay, I gave this book TWO second chances because I had heard great things about it, but I eventually gave up.

It's certainly a gutsy choice to have a person with no empathy as your main character, but it's pretty hard to get readers to care about someone who has only a vaguely intellectual interest in other people. Especially if the story is told in the first person by this character.
So as a result, we know that one guy is a vampire, and another guy has some kind of prosthetic senses, and there...more

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Aug 23, 2007 Mike rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Fans and foes of Dennett; those mourning Dick and Bester

Watts writes stuff steeped in hard- and plain-whacked- science. At times he's channeling journal articles as well as Alfred Bester--it caroms from pulp to cog-psych theory and can jar. (He also writes like he found Camus too sunny, and sought here to make amends.)

But a blast. Works as a revamped (ahem) version of the first-contact story. Aliens intrude at the edges of space, and a misfit team sent to greet them. Communication confounded, conflict inside the human craft, and trouble abounds.

Watt...more

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Jun 09, 2008 Jesse rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

So I read a lot of science and speculative fiction. and a lot of it is crap, more or less. Peter Watts is obviously very smart (and has a Ph.D. to back it up - oooh, scary) but is only a marginally gifted storyteller. Blindsight raises a lot of interesting questions about our self-perception (as individuals and as a species), about xenophobia and about our penchant for projecting ourselves into every situation, but the characters all felt contrived and the story doesn't really unfold so much as...more

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Jul 18, 2007 Ferret rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: sf, hugoquest

Wow... that as a pretty intense book. The characters were all insane, the setting was extremely complicated, and the stakes were huge. I still can't quite process the ending. But I do know that even though it was intellectual heavy-lifting to work my way through the book, I enjoyed reading it. I don't necessarily advocate science fiction as heavily pegged to modern science as this one was in all cases, but hard science fiction has its pleasures, and this was a beautiful extrapolative work of har...more

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Jan 05, 2013 Palmyrah rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This could have been a four-star book if it didn't feature one of those kickable, conflicted, self-pitying post-adolescent anti-heroes so commonly found in graphic 'novels', cyberpunk epics, heavy-metal song lyrics and other entertainments aimed at young males. I loathe the little creeps. Where have all the grown-up heroes gone?

Anyway: Blindsight is a first-contact story (I'm always a sucker for those) that offers a potent blend of non-stop action and some smart ideas from information theory, ne...more This could have been a four-star book if it didn't feature one of those kickable, conflicted, self-pitying post-adolescent anti-heroes so commonly found in graphic 'novels', cyberpunk epics, heavy-metal song lyrics and other entertainments aimed at young males. I loathe the little creeps. Where have all the grown-up heroes gone?

Anyway: Blindsight is a first-contact story (I'm always a sucker for those) that offers a potent blend of non-stop action and some smart ideas from information theory, neuroscience, evolutionary biology and transhumanism. These ideas are not bolted on to the narrative chassis but are integral to the plot and action. Kudos to the author for that.

Synopsis: a group of radically altered humans (led by a vampire – no, come back!) is sent to investigate an alien artefact hiding in the Oort cloud. Their attempts to learn about it and figure its occupants out move along a sliding scale of increasing aggressiveness, even though the artefact doesn't fight back (at least, not at first...)

Verdict: Blindsight kept me interested and eagerly turning the pages all the way to the end. And the ending was quite satisfactory in its way, though the twist in the tail was somewhat ambiguous. Anyone who enjoys action-packed hard (really hard) science fiction will get a lot out of this book.

For all that, there are some serious concerns. Much of the action takes place in an environment that is very hard to describe, and though the author tries his damndest, he doesn't quite pull it off. I'd say the problem was too much detail and not enough context.

More seriously yet, the book lacks a solid moral compass. The humans are the bad guys – there's even a torture scene, described from the torturer's rather than the victim's viewpoint, which made me angry with the author because it demanded my imaginary complicity in something I deplore – but, while making it clear that nearly everyone in the book is a bit of a creep, the author seems entirely neutral about the moral consequences of the things he's describing. There seems to be an overarching, unspoken assumption that the world is crap, people are the pits, that's just the way it is and there's nothing we can do about it. Is that how young people think nowadays? I must be getting old.(less)

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Feb 16, 2009 Hien rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fiction

This is a dark first contact story. The gold standard in first contact story for me used to be The Mote in God's Eye. I would have to say this is now my new gold standard. This book falls in the hard sci-fi genre. Diamond hard for sure. Some people may find all the techno lingo a bit off-putting. If you're a fan of hard sci-fi then you'll love it.

The aliens in this book are so utterly alien in both biology and psychology as to be almost incomprehensible. It raises some interesting questions abou...more

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Dec 17, 2008 Michelle rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: sf

Dark and thought provoking SF - grim first contact scenario. A crew of five (and their cryo-suspended replacements) are sent on a foolhardy mission after the Earth is surprised by alien scouts. Waking up confused, 15 AU off course, the crew members are hard pressed to comprehend the aliens (or their intentions towards humans). Weird stuff, like extinct vampires re-constituted from DNA (think Jurassic Park), surprisingly works. Watts is excellent at describing concepts, SF tech, and alien ships &...more

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May 03, 2012 Fellini rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: kindle

Лучшее из прочитанного за почти полтора месяца этого года. Вероятно, одна из лучших книг года. И да, это пишу я, человек, руками и ногами отмахивавшийся от фантастики "с звездолётами и бластерами".
И те, и другие в книге присутствуют, но больше для декораций. В космическом корабле, который, по законам жанра где-то на другом конце Вселенной встречает инопланетян, постоянно что-то происходит. Попытки наладить контакт с внеземным разумом, внутриэкипажные отношения, воспоминания героя-рассказчика о п...more Лучшее из прочитанного за почти полтора месяца этого года. Вероятно, одна из лучших книг года. И да, это пишу я, человек, руками и ногами отмахивавшийся от фантастики "с звездолётами и бластерами".
И те, и другие в книге присутствуют, но больше для декораций. В космическом корабле, который, по законам жанра где-то на другом конце Вселенной встречает инопланетян, постоянно что-то происходит. Попытки наладить контакт с внеземным разумом, внутриэкипажные отношения, воспоминания героя-рассказчика о прошлом - всё это достаточно интересно. Но люблю я их не за это (ц).
По ходу действия автор выдвигает столько прекрасных теорий, столько приводит интересных рассуждений: о природе вампиров, о сознании и подсознании, о интеллекте и разумности, о анатомии и физиологии встреченных инопланетян. Я вспоминала и основы биологии, и теорию игр, и недавно прочитанную "Человек, который принял свою жену за шляпу". Уоттс не голословен, в послесловии он проясняет основные моменты своих теорий, ссылаясь на список из полутора сотен научных публикаций. За что ему отдельное уважение и восхищение.
Да такое, что все корявости перевода сглаживает.
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согласно теории игр, нельзя никому говорить, когда у тебя день рождения.
— Не понимаю.
— Проигрышная ситуация. Выигрышной стратегии нет.
— Что значит «стратегии»? Это же просто день рождения.
Челси, когда я пытался ей объяснить, сказала то же самое. «Смотри, — говорил я, — предположим, ты всем расскажешь, когда у тебя день рождения, и ничего не происходит. Это вроде как оскорбительно».
«Или, предположим, тебе закатят вечеринку», — отозвалась тогда Челси. «Но ты не знаешь, сделано это искренне или ты своим предыдущим сообщением пристыдил знакомых отметить дату, на которую они предпочли бы забить. Но если ты никому не скажешь, и никто не отметит твой день рождения, то причин обижаться не будет, потому что, в конце концов, никто же не знал. А если кто-нибудь все же поставит тебе выпивку, ты поймешь, что это от чистого сердца, так как никто не станет тратить силы на то, чтобы выяснить, когда же у тебя все-таки день рождения — а потом еще и отмечать его, — если только ты этим людям в самом деле небезразличен».
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в мозгу прячутся не только измерительные приборы. В нем содержится образ мира, и мы вовсе не глядим вовне; наше сознательное «я» видит лишь модельку, интерпретацию реальности, постоянно обновляемую соответствии с поступающими данными. Что случится, когда ввод оборвется, а модель — поврежденная травмой или опухолью — не сможет обновиться? Долго ли мы станем пялиться на устарелую отрисовку, пережевывая и вымучивая те же мертвые данные в отчаянном, подсознательном, совершенно искреннем отрицании реальности? Скоро ли нас озарит, что мир, который мы видим, больше не отражает мира, в котором мы обитаем, что мы слепы?
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Мозг — это инструмент выживания, а не детектор лжи. Там, где самообман способствует приспособлению, мозг лжет. Перестает замечать… неважные вещи. Истина не имеет значения. Только приспособленность. В настоящем времени вы вовсе не воспринимаете мир таким, какой он есть. Вы воспринимаете модель, построенную на догадках. Реконструкции. Ложь.
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Ты зовешь себя Homo sapiens — человек разумный. Да имеешь ли ты хоть представление о том, что он такое, этот разум, который ты поминаешь с таким восторгом? Ты хоть знаешь, на что он годится?
Ты, может, думаешь, разум дает тебе свободу воли? Или забыл, что безумцы разговаривают, водят машины, совершают преступления и убирают улики — и все это время находятся без сознания? Или никто не сказал тебе, что даже те, кто бодрствует, — всего лишь рабы, отрицающие очевидность?
Сделай осознанный выбор. Реши шевельнуть указательным пальцем. Поздно! Сигнал уже миновал локоть. Тело начало действовать за добрых полсекунды до того, как твое сознание решилось это сделать, ведь сознание ничего не решает; твоим телом распорядилось что-то иное, а гомункулу в черепушке только пояснительную записку отправило — если не забыло. Человечек в голове, самонадеянная подпрограмма, полагающая себя личностью, принимает взаимную связь за причинную; он читает записку, видит, как шевелится палец, и считает, что второе вызвано первым.
Но он ничем не управляет. И ты не управляешь. Если и существует в природе свободная воля, она не снисходит до таких, как ты.
==========
Когда тебя бросает в дрожь от прекрасной мелодии, это врубается механизм поощрения в лимбической системе — тот же механизм, что вознаграждает человека за секс с привлекательной партнершей и поглощение больших количеств сахарозы. Иными словами, это взлом системы; твой мозг научился получать награду, не заслужив ее увеличением приспособленности. Это приятно, это делает нашу жизнь ценной и полной.(less)

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May 02, 2012 Alex rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: brainfuck, could-not-stop, cthulhu-fhtagn, grimdark, h-plus, mystery, social-exploration

Складна, розумна, насичена книжка-подорож. Книжка-дослід. Книжка що прикидається оповіддю про Перший Контакт. Але не дайте себе оманути, замість інопланетян тут основні герої -- люди. Не персоналії, а люди як вид.

Автор жонглює найхимернішими патологіями людського мозку, найдивнішими фактами про наш розум, для того щоб повернути, випнути, показати на увесь світ питання яке йому(та гурту психологів-дослідників) видається очевидним -- який нам зиск із свідомості? Розум так, допоміг розпалити перше...more Складна, розумна, насичена книжка-подорож. Книжка-дослід. Книжка що прикидається оповіддю про Перший Контакт. Але не дайте себе оманути, замість інопланетян тут основні герої -- люди. Не персоналії, а люди як вид.

Автор жонглює найхимернішими патологіями людського мозку, найдивнішими фактами про наш розум, для того щоб повернути, випнути, показати на увесь світ питання яке йому(та гурту психологів-дослідників) видається очевидним -- який нам зиск із свідомості? Розум так, допоміг розпалити перше багаття -- а чи потрібна нам свідомість? Нам як видові, як гравцю на еволюційній арені. Чи не заважає вона нам, якщо вже так?

Отже, відправте на зустріч із чужаками лінгвіста що поділила себе на чотири персоналії, жінку-воїна, найвідомішим актом якої є зрада, вчених що замінили добрячу частину своєї сенсорики на можливість відчувати на смак інфразвук та бачити електромагнітні поля. Поставте над ними капітаном відтвореного із решток H. sapiens whedonum, себто вампіра. Дайте їм в архівісти інваліда дитинства, що живе лише з однією півкулею мозку та абсолютно не здатен співпереживати та співчувати.

Їх зустрінуть чужі гідні самих страшних фільмів Рідлі Скотта.

І однією з перших цитат книги є:
"If we're not in pain, we're not alive."
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Jul 25, 2010 La pointe de la sauce rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

'By now you don't experience the world as it exists at all. You experience a simulation built from assumptions. Shortcuts. Lies.' - Blindsight

I realized that this is the book that reignited my research into metaphysics and I hadn't even bothered writing a proper review on it... and I still can't because it is the most hard hitting sci-fi I've EVER read and I wouldnt want to destroy the experience for anyone planning on reading it.

What I will discuss though is one of the central and most fascin...more 'By now you don't experience the world as it exists at all. You experience a simulation built from assumptions. Shortcuts. Lies.' - Blindsight

I realized that this is the book that reignited my research into metaphysics and I hadn't even bothered writing a proper review on it... and I still can't because it is the most hard hitting sci-fi I've EVER read and I wouldnt want to destroy the experience for anyone planning on reading it.

What I will discuss though is one of the central and most fascinating themes in the book:
Consciousness vs Intelligence/Intuition.

Imagine a world a few hundred years from now with AI's so intelligent that they actually do have the answer to the universe, life and everything (no the answer isn't 42) and it only takes it a few days for it to express the answer in words. The problem is, how do you explain to a monkey (which is basically what we still are) what the answer is in a language that has not yet evolved to express metaphysical concepts. We hardly know how gravity works. We still don't know how many dimensions exist in space. Take the smallest question of whether light is a wave or particle and the truth is we just don't know. But we've been able to build an AI which has the intelligence to process uncorrupted data and has come up with an answer but unfortunately we just don't understand the answer and the AI will be unable to translate the answer to our level of understanding without corrupting it. The answer might as well be '42' or 'cellar-door'. This I think is the problem with the search for absolute answers to metaphysical questions. Until you actually understand the question you're asking there is no chance of you understanding the answer.

Okay now imagine youre able to design all the sensory apparatus required for this AI to be 'conscious' to a certain degree and not only that, the AI has the capacity to develop super-intelligent versions of itself, a Super-AI that thinks and learns and acts and creates must have a mind. The A.I has the possession of a models of reality and the ability to use these models to conceive and plan actions and to predict their outcomes - intelligence. Now keep multiplying the 'models' of reality to include the whole spectrum of human life/reality and we must agree that these machines are 'conscious' (just as we are) they apply an algorithm to reality, (just as we do) and come up with the relevant action our outcome based on their subjective existence but unlike us they're predictions and actions are always precisely right. They are able to imagine impossible problems or scenarios which they can immediately solve. It could be argued that the only prerequisite to consciousness is intelligence and not the other way around. In fact our discussion of 'mind' or 'consciousness' will be irrelevant, the only determining factor is intelligence.

We could come to the conclusion that 'human consciousness' really is a flaw within an intuitively intelligent brain, a brain that is capable of independently processing, intuitively reacting and acting on it's own accord, a brain which is always aware and constantly trying to draw our attention to imminent dangers and when that fails it final takes control of central processing and acts reflexively. The analogy used in the book is perfectly pitched: imagine the AI I described earlier, it's a fucking savant at everything,[ it's the human brain,:] now hand it's control over to an old-fat lazy man, and put this man in the driving seat, the savant is strapped into the passenger seat, the old fat man is in charge and insists on being in charge. The savant instantly knows the answer to problems but the old man insists on reprocessing the data provided by the savant under the pretext of 'human consciousness' and in trying to process the data corrupts or misunderstands it, constantly forgetting, constantly making wrong decisions, totally unaware. This is our idea of being 'conscious' then it really is a flaw.

This savant is part of us, operating subconsciously a part of us knows the answer, we just need to turn around once in a while and listen to what it's trying to say - Blindsight.
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Jul 10, 2008 Mark rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Sci Fi fans who love the "First Contact" sub genre.

Shelves: sciencefiction

It's very soon after my read of "Blindsight". I'm still sort of mulling the concepts about in my head. There's not a lot of action in this book. It's a "hard" science fiction novel with some deep philosophy mixed in for taste. I liked it because it made me think about my preconceived notions of mind/body/soul, the interaction between them, and what constitutes "sentience". However, it's not what I'd call a casual read. It's well written, I suppose, but it's not a "page-turner".

The Plot

The main...more

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Apr 29, 2008 Kim rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I read this book entirely online (http://www.rifters.com/real/Blindsigh... ) during down time at work (don't tell my boss).

Wow. This was definitely a wow book. I loved the characters. Every single one of them was incredibly interesting. In the not-so-distant future, a small group of mental freaks is sent out to the edge of the solar system to investigate a possible alien presence. The narrator, Siri, underwent a hemispherectomy as a kid (had half is brain removed) and as a result lost his empath...more

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Apr 15, 2008 Keith Frampton rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: people interested in consciousness, hard science fiction fans

First contact stories are a staple of science fiction and it is a pleasure to read one that is different. This book isn’t an easy read as it is densely written, is dependent on serious science, does not include large ‘info dumps’ to explain everything and explores assumptions we have about ourselves and how we think that are not, at least for me, easy to interact with. That said, it is a dark, almost brooding, tale set in the future with aliens that are nothing like us in physiology, psychology,...more

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Oct 23, 2007 Anthony rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Peter Watts' web site contains a rather unusual quote on it's main page from James Nicoll, "Whenever I find my will to live becoming too strong, I read Peter Watts." Peter himself says he doesn't consider himself pessimistic, but merely "follows the data."

This book, like his others, is firmly based in present-day science with sensible extensions woven in where necessary for extrapolation. A marine biologist by training, he admits to having a had a lot of help writing this story since it is his f...more

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Aug 22, 2008 John rated it 5 of 5 stars

Here's another very dark SF story from Peter Watts. It has a complicated backstory that is dealt with in an appendix (and online), but vampires have been genetically re-engineered from ancient genes. Mentally and physically superior to Homo sapiens sapiens, but physiologically enslaved by them, the vampires serve as councilors to humanity. That's all an aside, however, as the main plot deals with the discovery of an alien intelligence hiding in the Oort cloud around our solar system. A team is s...more

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Dec 28, 2008 Lightreads rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, science-fiction

Yes, it is not quite as good as I’d been told, but orders of magnitude more brilliant than anyone had conveyed. Which statement will be very puzzling to anyone who hasn’t read the book, but just take my word for it: it makes perfect sense. And yes, this book will deservedly win this year’s Hugo, if the rumblings are right. Sorry, Temeraire, you’ll have another shot, I’m sure.

So. The actual review. Summarizing this book is quite difficult without being far too parsimonious or far too verbose. It...more

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May 04, 2013 Suhrob rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

It is more than a decade I read a proper sci-fi (barring some P. K. Dick) and if I saw this in a bookstore I'd avoid it in a big circle: a small crew has first contact with a completely alien race - how original! But wait - this one has also a vampire in it! A vampire in space! Isn't it great?

Thanks internet I have collected some credible filtration/recommendation channels and gave the book a shot.

And it is absolutely fantastic! Very well written, deeply researched, scientifically plausible and...more

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Mar 18, 2013 Христо Блажев rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Невъзможните човеци, невъзможните извънземни: http://knigolandia.info/book-review/s...

“Слепоглед” ми отвъртя главата – физически в преносния смисъл, на мисловно ниво – в прекия. Хардкор фантастика, която по своята същност е нехудожествена книга, обследваща сложни и още нерешени проблеми от психологията, когнитивистиката, биологията, генетиката, космологията, статистиката и още какви ли не науки. А в художествения си замисъл книгата се родее както с огромната “Рама” на Кларк (а и неговите “Одисеи...more Невъзможните човеци, невъзможните извънземни: http://knigolandia.info/book-review/s...

“Слепоглед” ми отвъртя главата – физически в преносния смисъл, на мисловно ниво – в прекия. Хардкор фантастика, която по своята същност е нехудожествена книга, обследваща сложни и още нерешени проблеми от психологията, когнитивистиката, биологията, генетиката, космологията, статистиката и още какви ли не науки. А в художествения си замисъл книгата се родее както с огромната “Рама” на Кларк (а и неговите “Одисеи”), така и с “Битие” на Брин, “Градът и градът” на Миевил и други. Творението на Питър Уотс не може, просто не може да се прочете на един дъх, а без пространните бележки към великолепния превод на Елена Павлова и разбирането би останало на половинчато ниво. Самата Елена в рубриката “През очите на…” в блога на “Изток-Запад” описва книгата с думите: “Питър Уотс е забол човешкото съзнание, нашия алтер, все едно закарфичена за стиропорена подложка муха.” Няма по-добро сравнение – сред тези страници човечеството е дисекцирано внимателно и критично – и резултатът очаквано е по-скоро негативен.

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