Blindsight by Peter Watts. Consciousness. Perception. Intelligence.

[Not a Physicist]

I would like to recommend "Blindsight", by Peter Watts, a science fiction novel. 

 

Available from the usual sources but also available for free on the authors website. It was nominated for best novel in 2007 Hugo Awards. 

 

It comes with footnotes and a bibliography.  

 

http://rifters.com/real/Blindsight.htm

 

This is hard science fiction, despite the fact it has a vampire. Don't let that put you off. Its not about vampires. In connection to the vampire it depicts them as race of humans, long ago diverged on the evolutionary tree, and long since extinct until science discovers their genetics and revives them. 

 

The novel is about a crew of enhanced humans sent off to investigate an alien presence detected in the Kuiper belt, but which eventually leads them into the Oort cloud. 

 

It will challenge your views of consciousness, evolution, identity, and the value of intelligence. The book actually makes a case for the value of non-sentience as a survival strategy. There's nothing I could say that will give anything away. I could lay out the plot and still only capture a fraction of the book.

 

Only 400 pages or so, its a *big* work. I refer you to the Amazon Kindle review pages where will can get a more in depth telling of the book. 

 

Anyone interested in consciousness and selfhood will find this book an intriguing read.  

 

http://www.amazon.com/Blindsight-Peter-Watts/dp/0765319640/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1408720112&sr=8-1&keywords=blindsightkei

 

I excerpt one review below:

 

"Blindsight tells of an expedition to investigate the apparent arrival of aliens in the Solar System. A ship, crewed by four strangely enhanced humans and commanded by a genetically recreated vampire, arrives in the far Oort cloud, and discovers an unusual and environmentally hostile object. Attempts to communicate are ambiguous -- it seems to contain intelligent actors, but it offers no real information, and warns them off. Naturally, the humans refuse to leave, and we are treated to attempts to land on the alien "ship" or "device" or whatever -- again met with ambiguous but mostly hostile responses.

 

All this is interesting, but it hides the real interest of the book. The story is told by Siri Keeton, who is essentially autistic, and who "translates" the observations of the oddly altered specialists on the mission to terms that "normal" humans back on Earth can understand. So we learn something of the nature of these enhanced people: one is a vampire, one is a military genius of sorts, one has a cybernetic sensorium, and one, a linguist, has (on purpose) multiple personalities. In addition we learn of Siri Keeton's personal life: a mother who has retreated to a simulation, an often absent "spook" father, a love affair with a woman who specializes in tailored brain chemistry alterations.

 

The eventual point of all this, and of the eventually realized true nature of the aliens, is speculation on the nature of concsiousness. Is consciousness real? Is it really useful? Is it necessary for intelligence? How much of the world around us do we really perceive and how much do our brains "simulate" for us? What our our brains capable of? How would predators think differently? Is real communication with aliens possible?

 

Fascinating stuff throughout, wonderful "big idea" SF."