Blindsight (Watts Novel)

AI-driven systems now offer complex linguistic capabilities, but their true understanding of communication remains unproven.

In 2082, Earth detected an extraterrestrial presence after thousands of comet-like objects, dubbed "Fireflies," burned up in the atmosphere while broadcasting across the electromagnetic spectrum. Soon after, a satellite discovered a radio signal from a comet named "Burns-Caulfield," prompting humanity to send out three waves of probes, culminating in a crewed ship called the Theseus. Propelled by an antimatter reactor and captained by an AI, the Theseus carried five hyper-specialized transhumans, including a genetically reincarnated vampire as nominal commander. The second wave of probes investigating Burns-Caulfield caused it to self-destruct, leading the Theseus to a new destination: a sub-brown dwarf in the Oort cloud called 'Big Ben.' There, the crew discovered a concealed object identified as 'Rorschach,' which communicated in human languages it had learned by eavesdropping. Subsequent exploration of Rorschach revealed it was a vessel filled with radiation and inhabited by non-conscious, highly intelligent organisms called 'Scramblers.' After conflict arose between humans and Scramblers, the Theseus self-destructed to destroy Rorschach, with one crew member, Siri Keeton, escaping to report back to Earth.

The novel suggests that consciousness, particularly the human ego, might be an evolutionary dead end, consuming resources without providing a significant Darwinian advantage. This challenges the anthropocentric view of intelligence and raises questions about the fundamental nature and purpose of self-awareness in both biological and artificial systems.

The encounter with Rorschach and the Scramblers highlights a potential dichotomy between intelligence and consciousness, where advanced intelligence can exist without self-awareness. This has profound implications for the development of artificial general intelligence (AGI), suggesting that machines could achieve high levels of operational capability without necessarily possessing subjective experience, impacting how we define and test for sentience.