Blindsight
by Peter Watts · first published 2006
73% recommend25% neutral2% critical
Why HN recommends it
Hard sci-fi first-contact story built on consciousness and cognition, with an alien intelligence that is smart but not self-aware; cited with real papers in footnotes. Suits readers who want a dark, idea-dense read.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
Two months since the stars fell... Two months since sixty-five thousand alien objects clenched around the Earth like a luminous fist, screaming to the heavens as the atmosphere burned them to ash. Two months since that moment of brief, bright surveillance by agents unknown. Two months of silence while a world holds its breath. Now some half-derelict space probe, sparking fitfully past Neptune's orbit, hears a whisper from the edge of the solar system: a faint signal sweeping the cosmos like a lighthouse beam. Whatever's out there isn't talking to us. It's talking to some distant s
Affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
Related books
2014–2026Echopraxia
Peter Watts
Recommended by 45 · mentioned by 6645 recommend · 66 mention45 recommend · 6645 recommend
2016–2026Children of Time
Adrian Tchaikovsky
Recommended by 207 · mentioned by 263207 recommend · 263 mention207 recommend · 263207 recommend
Permutation City
Greg Egan
Recommended by 256 · mentioned by 354256 recommend · 354 mention256 recommend · 354256 recommend
2008–2026His Master's Voice
Stanisław Lem
Recommended by 49 · mentioned by 6649 recommend · 66 mention49 recommend · 6649 recommend
2008–2026Solaris
Stanisław Lem
Recommended by 34 · mentioned by 4934 recommend · 49 mention34 recommend · 4934 recommend
2014–2026Three-Body Problem
Cixin Liu, Ken Liu
Recommended by 233 · mentioned by 513233 recommend · 513 mention233 recommend · 513233 recommend
2011–2026Roadside Picnic
Arkadii Strugatskii, Boris Strugatskii, Arkady and Boris Strugatsky
Recommended by 76 · mentioned by 12976 recommend · 129 mention76 recommend · 12976 recommend
2009–2026Revelation Space
Alastair Reynolds, John Lee
Recommended by 78 · mentioned by 12378 recommend · 123 mention78 recommend · 12378 recommend
I ended up reading the book Blindsight (Peter Watts) that's been floating around in comments recently. A major theme in the book is intelligence and its relation to consciousness (including whether consciousness is even beneficial). If you…
on “Is DALL-E 2 ‘gluing things together’ without understanding their relationships?” ↗…superintelligence but without consciousness. You might then realize that there is no obvious mechanism which requires the two to appear or evolve together. It's a curious concept, well illustrated in the novel Blindsight by Peter Watts. I won't spoil anything here but I'll highly recommend the book.
on “DeepMind: A Generalist Agent” ↗It is an existential horror SciFi novel, but BlindSight by Peter Watts is the only book I've seen talk about this idea. Avoiding totally spoiling the book, it asks the question: "Is consciousness really a survival trait in the long term?"
on “Human intelligence is overrated (2012)” ↗I recommend "Blindsight" by Peter Watts, who was a marine biologist before he was an author. He's the only author I can think of who uses academic style citations for hard scifi credibility. You can read Blindsight online or…
on “Science Fiction by Scientists” ↗Blindsight by Peter Watts Very strong hard sci-fi with mind-bending approach to the question of conscience. And vampires (not the Twilight kind, the scary kind). https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/48484.Blindsight…
on “Ask HN: Recommend one book I need to read this summer?” ↗The hard SF novel Blindsight, by Peter Watts, is an excellent and extremely interesting exploration of this idea and its ramifications.
on “Blindsight: Some people who have lost their vision find a “second sight”” ↗…Materials trilogy too. Leviathan Wakes disappoints: its plot and political economy are interesting but on a sentence-by-sentence level one wishes for more. If you haven't read it yet try Peter Watts, Blindsight.
on “YC’s Summer Reading” ↗If you like reading about minds that are fundamentally different from our own, you might also enjoy the science fiction novel "Blindsight" by Peter Watts. Exploring the space of possible minds in the universe is a fundamental theme of that work.
on “Just how smart is an octopus?” ↗The novel Blindsight by Peter Watts considers the issues humans would face in contact with similarly alien aliens. It's an intriguing read. Available under CC: https://rifters.com/real/Blindsight.htm#CC
on “What's it like to be an Octopus? (2017)” ↗Very tangentially related, though with AI and aliens, if you haven't read Blindsight by Peter Watts, you owe it to yourself to check it out. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blindsight_(Watts_novel)
on “Repurposing the cadaver of a spider to create a pneumatically actuated gripper” ↗…read for some perhaps. I agree it is a bit slow at times, but worth it. If you want a denser read (less setup, etc.) that also has a lot of really thought-provoking concepts, I highly recommend also "Blindsight" by Peter Watts. Blindsight is probably my all time favorite scifi novel, actually.
on “China talking with European Space Agency about moon outpost” ↗If you want some first contact stories that are better (IMO) than The Three Body Problem, try: - Blindsight by Peter Watts (cannot recommend this strongly enough) - The Forge of God and sequel Anvil of Stars by Greg Bear - Pushing Ice by Alastair Reynolds - Roadside Picnic by Arkady and Boris Strugatsky…
on “China's Race to Find Aliens First” ↗…trilogy) - "Snow Crash" by Neal Stephenson - "Pandora's Star" by Peter F. Hamilton (part of the Commonwealth Saga) - "Hyperion" and "Fall of Hyperion" by Dan Simmons - "Lock In" by John Scalzi - "Blindsight" by Peter Watts
on “How Isaac Asimov shaped robotics and space exploration and predicted the Internet” ↗I enjoyed Blindsight by Peter Watts. It explores several different interesting ideas. For instance, what is the point of empathy/friendship/love in a technologically advanced society? These were very useful things for our…
on “Ask HN: Mind bending books to read and never be the same as before?” ↗…Butler's Xenogenesis series is a must read for science fiction fans, the sci-fi section has some genuinely horrible recommendations in it. Also given that it's supposed to be a mind-expanding list, throw in Blindsight by Peter Watts. The fantasy section needs Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast. (and throw Harry Potter out) Sexual Personae by Paglia deserves to be named in the Gender/sexuality section. And an off-beat recommendation.…
on “Mind-expanding books” ↗