Blindsight

[Nachimir]

I might have picked up the recommendation to read Blindsight by Peter Watts here, I see it's been mentioned in a few threads. I read it in a couple of sittings yesterday.

 

It's billed as hard science fiction, which I quite like, but there are a few clumsy diversions that seem like he's regurgitating something he read in Scientific American (the acknowledgements make very clear he put a lot more research effort in than that though), and it's obvious he puts a lot of trust in evolutionary psychology which, while it has a lot of defenders, is often speculative. All of those were quite small things though compared to a fascinating central premise that doesn't become obvious until quite far in:

 

That the universe it teeming with life, that it's much smarter than us, but none of it is sentient and consciousness is essentially a parasite.

 

I've absorbed a lot of science fiction, but that idea was entirely new to me and an interesting take on the Fermi paradox.

[Goose Malloy]

I utterly loved this book when I read it a while ago, and was pleasantly surprised to see this thread about it today, as I'd been thinking about it only yesterday due to my recommending it to my brother, so this was a nice coincidence. I hear Watts has recently released another book set in the same universe, I'll have to pick that up.

 

I apologise for not attempting to discuss the thematic contents of the books but it's far too early in the morning for me here and I would undoubtedly embarrass myself (and it's been a bit too long since my reading it for me to be particularly insightful), but may I ask if there are any other books of a similar vein that you would recommend, give that you say you've absorbed a lot of science fiction? I'm actually really quite a novice when it comes to the genre, despite my general geekiness, so I really found Blindsight's exploration of the philosophy of mind and the nature of conciousness really fascinating, whereas perhaps for you the effect was somewhat lessened because you were aware of antecedents that looked at similar themes. I've been wanting to ask this question for a while on the internet, but never found the right place to do so (any good scfi forums out there?) so your thread is much appreciated :-)

[Nachimir]

As I said that premise was entirely new to me, and I haven't read much hard SF. One author that springs to mind and seems relatively unknown (at least now) is Algis Budrys. I loved Rogue Moon, it's a very different kind of book to Blindsight and centres entirely on very human characters, but has a similarly bleak centre.

[Goose Malloy]

I see, thank you very much for the recommendation I shall attempt to have a look at it when I manage to find the time. I guess what I found really captivating with Blindsight, as someone who really is very ignorant with the state of written sci-fi as a whole, was its attempting to grapple with really rather deep philosophical questions while tying it them into what I found was a very engaging narrative.

 

I would hazard that, being someone who kinda comes from a background perhaps more grounded in philosophy (albeit mostly ancient stuff), this style of sci-fi as essentially being an examination of our own speculations about the nature of conciousness and so forth is much more appealing to me than the received image I usually have of sci-fi as often either using analogous aspects of future societies to critique aspects of our own (perhaps this was more the historical role of sci-fi with Nineteen Eighty-Four and whatnot), or the kind of space opera thing that I guess comes to mind when one thinks of Dune or 2001 (I'm aware "space opera" is an incredibly simplistic manner of referring to those two works.) This is of course a very reductive and perhaps rather slighting way of viewing vast swathes of the genre, but I really would like to read more books in a similar vein to Blindsight, so when dipping my toes into sci-fi I'd much rather read one of those than try and slug through a 600 page space opera.

 

I apologise for the somewhat rambling nature of this post and also possibly for being one of those assholes who barges into a genre where geeks are existing quite happily and starts insisting that everything possess more literary merit, hopefully I didn't do this too much.

[Nachimir]

Nope, while that is reductive I tend to agree. In my favourite SF, tech and imaginary societies decidedly take backstage to people.

[Gormongous]

Nope, while that is reductive I tend to agree. In my favourite SF, tech and imaginary societies decidedly take backstage to people.

 

No, I agree, and even in the best space opera, what works best is when the scope and grandeur of the background is set off by believable and sympathetic characters with something to contribute to the story beyond exposition dumps. That's why I've always praised Iain M. Banks and why I'm starting to praise Ann Leckie.

 

On the more direct topic of the thread, I read Blindsight last year and had a lot of the same reactions. I found Watts a bit too enamored with his own erudition and prone to overly cute character touches, but on the whole, his obsession with psychology lead to a fascinating answer to the Fermi Paradox. That said, I have trouble convincing myself to read the rest of Watts' work and have absolutely no interest in the sequel Echopraxia.

 

... And now, double-checking Wikipedia about Watts, I learn that he cannot ever enter the US because of an aggravated felony charge with US customs that sounds like total bullshit. What a bummer, no wonder I never hear about him at cons or anything.

[Nachimir]

I found Watts a bit too enamored with his own erudition and prone to overly cute character touches

 

 

I particularly hate when people lean on evolutionary psychology to talk about competitive and adversarial behaviour while entirely ignoring cooperative behaviour and species. At points Blindsight seems to do that, and I sometimes couldn't tell how much of that was Siris outlook and how much the authors.