"Alastair Reynolds - Feeling Rejected" - читать интересную книгу автора (Reynolds Alastair)

by the uppermost track on the three-
parameter model of Bataleur and Becard
(2049). In their unmodified form, adult
members of this species are 3-metre tall
hexapodal oxygen-breathers with a DNA-
based reproductive system. The species
has a well-developed central nervous sys-
tem withmarked hemispheric asymmetry.
The authors apply standard analysis
tools and methods to extract cultural
information from the intercepted signal.
Given the absence of anything startlingly
new in their approach, the amount of
space that the authors spend discussing
this process is puzzling. Itmight havebeen
better simply to reference one of the many
review papers on the matter, such as the
recent and comprehensive overview of
analysis methods given in [omitted].
The authors then move on to the main
part of their paper: a lengthy discussion of
the information content of the decoded
message. They summarize the nature of
the transmitting civilization, the physiol-
ogy and evolutionary background of the
inhabitants, their technology and culture.
Although broadly satisfactory in its
details, this section would benefit from
shortening. As an example, the authors
dwell on the construction methods used
in the Dyson sphere that the aliens have
erected around their star, despite the fact
that broadly similar planet-dismantling,
reforging and gravity-control methods
have been used by at least 138 other Kar-
dashev II cultures (see, for instance,
Takahe and Smew, 2045). In the very first
sentence of subsection 3.2, the authors
state that there is тАЬnothing particularly
novel about the construction methodsтАЭ,
before nevertheless embarking on a blow-
by-blow account of those selfsame meth-
ods. I agree with the first sentence.
They conclude this section by present-
ing, in excerpted form, several images and
texts deemed to be of high significance
within the culture. These include 18 тАШstan-
zasтАЩ of a much longer epic тАШpoemтАЩ written
in commemoration of the collapse of part
of the polar region of their Dyson sphere