BLINDSIGHT

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I thought so," he says, as though she has. "It's really kind of...well, beautiful, in a way. Even the monsters, once you get to know 'em. We're all beautiful." The funny thing is, this quibble also does not detract from my assessment of this book as among the best of its kind. The fact that I find Peter’s argument insufficiently nuanced doesn’t actually change the fact that he makes it brilliantly, that his ideas are horrible and fascinating and glitter like a swarm of darkly jeweled beetle carapaces. In addition to cosmology and evolution, Peter hangs his plot on a hard-biology explanation for vampire legends that alone, in the hands of a lesser author, would be sufficient for a series of novels. Here, it’s just a subplot that reinforces the novel’s thematic argument: One more kind of instinct-driven monster to inhabit his monstrous world. One more creature that imagines itself real, confronted with an objective reality that is utterly oblivious to its existence. The above was written after my first pass through Blindsight. I then went on to read Peter Watts’ follow-up novel Echopraxia. Then, after finishing Echopraxia, I listened to Blindshight a second time. One reason for this experiment at repeat listening is that I find so few well-written serious modern Hard Science Fiction novels; this being one, I wanted to experience it again. The impact of the horror element for me was much reduced the second time through. I was more focused on the use of scientific concepts and less emotionally involved. I was fascinated at Watts’ ingenious utilization of scientific concepts to advance his psychologically driven story. The story is now more comprehensible to me after a second listen, although, because of that greater understanding, I was more settled mentally and, therefore, less susceptible to the gothic horror elements that so impacted me during my first listen. This is a novel that will appeal to lovers of psychological thrillers and space opera fans alike. In fact, this is an exemplary SF novel that I will recommend to those who think that Science Fiction novels do not have anything to offer. Same here - if Starfish didn't touch any social or political subjects and was only a sci-fi story about bunch of transhumans cleaning pipelines somewhere beyond the sea - that would be all right with me. My tastes are quite simple, you know.

Another author's description (in the introduction) of the author's way of writing a multi-G course correction as "Melville-esque" was pretty sycophantic. I was expecting a novel with a fleshed-out story but what I read may have been a scientific paper disguised as genre fiction. Peter can write a paragraph about a spaceship course-correcting on a high-g burn that would make Herman Melville wring his hands in envy. He can also vividly ground the reader in the viscerality of a character’s experience, the physical sensations and emotions, and make even vastly unlikable people sympathetic and compelling.I'm fine.' She isn't, but she's getting there. This anger is nowhere near critical mass; it's just a reflex, really, a spark budded off from the main reservoir. It decays exponentially with elapsed time. By the time she reaches her cubby she's feeling almost sorry for Fischer."

But the underwater parts, the mystery, the AI parts - it all pays off in the long range as a whole. a b c Shaviro, Steven. "Consequences of Panpsychism" (PDF): 14 . Retrieved 8 October 2014. {{ cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= ( help) The Gang are four distinct personalities in the mind of one woman, the ship's linguist. They are tasked with communicating with the aliens, if possible. A single personality "surfaces" to take control of their body at any given time. The active personality reveals itself through a change in tone and posture. These personalities express offence when referred to as " alters". The personalities are:And then ..... then you end up with stories that make you spin around and wonder what did you just read. I had the same thoughts when I read Revelation Space and some of the works by Peter F Hamilton and Adrian Tchaikovsky. That being said, it's a nice little short. I think I would have liked it more if I'd read it before I finished the series, because there is some intense (eloquent) characterization and the post/transhuman future he details is deeply thought provoking. But I already knew the characters and had gotten my thoughts provoked by Firefall, so all this did was fill in some details about a time and place that hadn't had much attention in Firefall. Or maybe not. In this book, management has apparently decided that instead of ruining perfectly good personnel, they'll send down a bunch of pre-damaged individuals instead. People already "preadapted" for stressful situations: the criminally violent, the perverted, and the emotionally traumatized. It's kind of an interesting idea, but I was never convinced that this set of people could refrain from killing each other, much less do a single meaningful day's work. I’m actually rather happy, though, that I didn’t read the blurb. Because this book holds quite a few surprises, especially towards the end, when it all becomes rather big and scary and, yes, about survival. And the blurb here on Goodreads does give a few things away, that I’m glad I didn’t know. Perhaps. Certainly, the environment of the Theseus would be less strained, less nightmarish, without the lurking presence of Jukka Sarasti. All the same — and despite the fact that Blindsight was written before Twilight and True Blood ejaculated their stalker-romance branding all over the bookshelves, cinemas and televisions of the world — the vampires still seem more an indulgent inclusion than an integral part of the story.

It’s my opinion that the book you hold in your hand is the best hard science fiction novel of the first decade of the twenty-first century—and I say that as someone who remains unconvinced of the correctness of its central argument. In its own way, though, that nihilism itself can be comforting, and this is the place where I quibble. If it’s all futile, we’re excused from trying. And not trying is so much easier than trying-and-failing, it’s soothing to have an excuse.

The reference books mentioned at the beginning sound really interesting. I was tempted to look up some of his sources, but the likelihood that I would actually read any of these books is slim. Don't read this if you're expecting action (there is little action) or if you're not in the mood to explore the nature of alien-ness because you'll be disappointed. That being said - the narration is very good and the story is engaging and very hard to put down once you get started. The characters in Starfish are supposedly best suited for dangerous work in a highly stressful environment because they are survivors of trauma, those sexually and/or physically abused, and abusers themselves. Because, get this, they are "addicted to trauma." Bro, what? While it's true that survivors of trauma will sometimes, unknowingly or knowingly, seek out situations that recreate their trauma, and it's absolutely possible to become addicted to trauma, this is a decidedly self-destructive tendency. Survivors of trauma are in no way better suited to stressful situations, and are in fact way less likely to be able to handle stressful, traumatic situations.

For me the best part was when Ichthyander was diving in the depths of the ocean in his shiny blingy fish scale costume that no drag queen show would be ashamed of having in their wardrobe and I wasn't really that concerned about improving all kinds of working class' conditions or pleasing fishermen's daughters - I only cared about underwater stuff. These guys were transformed to survive 400 pressures in one of the deepest trenches in the ocean, to live on the local life, to supply energy to the rest of the world. So who would go down there, fully transformed with biological computers, on their own free will? Blindsight is fearless: a magnificent, darkly gleaming jewel of a book that hurdles the contradictions inherent in biochemistry, consciousness, and human hearts without breaking stride. Imagine you are Siri Keeton. Imagine you are nothing at all. You don't have to; Peter Watts has done it for you.” —Elizabeth Bear, author of Hammered Beyond this dumb as hell pseudo-psychological concept, the story is incredibly original and exciting. Parallel evolution at the bottom of the ocean is such a rich concept, but it's continually being detracted from by this bad science. priča se da korporacije već godinama kod prijava za posao traže da se ispuni i psihološki test da bi se otkrilo potencijalne psihopate, ne da ih eliminiraju nego da iz zaposle. Te glasine podupire jedno nedavno provedeno istraživanje:

Philosopher John Searle's Chinese room thought experiment is used as a metaphor to illustrate the tension between the notions of consciousness as an interior experience of understanding, as contrasted with consciousness as the emergent result of merely functional non-introspective components. [6] [9] [11] Blindsight contributes to this debate by implying that some aspects of consciousness are empirically detectable. [7] Specifically, the novel supposes that consciousness is necessary for both aesthetic appreciation [7] [8] [10] and for effective communication. [7] However, the possibility is raised that consciousness is, for humanity, an evolutionary dead end. [6] [9] [10] [11] That is, consciousness may have been naturally selected as a solution for the challenges of a specific place in space and time, but will become a limitation as conditions change or competing intelligences are encountered. [7] They are modified humans, able to survive in that high-pressure environment and all have something else in common: they are either victims of abuse or the abusers themselves: pedophiles, rapists, killers, psychotics, some with suicidal tendencies, others addicts on something. No problem if casualties appear; they are not welcome to live among normal people and nobody would miss them anyway, so who else is more fit to work in such a high risk environment?