Godel, Escher, Bach

Paperback, 256 pages

Spanish language

Published Oct. 11, 2007 by Tusquets.

ISBN:
978-84-8383-024-6
Copied ISBN!

View on OpenLibrary

4 stars (123 reviews)

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, this book applies Godel's seminal contribution to modern mathematics to the study of the human mind and the development of artificial intelligence.

42 editions

Review of 'Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid' on 'Storygraph'

4 stars

This book somehow manages to be a fairly light interesting read about a complex set of topics exemplified by the fundamental interconnectedness of all things. Hofstadter managed to connect all kinds of seemingly unrelated topics, and weave them together throughout the entire book

Un énorme pavé éclectique sur la logique interne des mathématiques, de l’art, de la musique, etc. Miam.

5 stars

Les personnes dépourvues d’un (gros) minimum d’esprit logique et mathématique et/ou de curiosité intellectuelle peuvent passer leur chemin. Les autres découvriront quelques-uns des principes fondamentaux qui gouvernent le monde, de l’abstraction aride des systèmes formels à l’ADN et à l’intelligence artificielle, de Bach le compositeur à Escher le dessinateur et à Gödel le logicien, tous liés d’une manière assez inattendue.

Version longue : www.coindeweb.net/blogsanssujetprecis/index.php?post/2008/04/16/487-godel-escher-bach-de-douglas-hofstadter

Review of 'Gödel, Escher, Bach : an eternal golden braid' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

This incredible book explores, through an utterly fascinating synthesis of disparate ideas, what it means to think. Gödel's theorem about the inherent incompleteness of formal systems in mathematics serves as the backbone, while the self-referential and dimension-transcending works of M.C. Escher and J. S. Bach are woven in as needed to illustrate and enrichen the narrative. Hofstadter precedes each chapter with a humorous dialogue between Achilles and the Tortoise, borrowed from Lewis Carroll, and other characters, to introduce (sometimes subtly!) the concepts he exposits later in a more conventional way. Drawing on number theory, genetics, computer science, Zen Buddhism, the brain, animal behavior, artificial intelligence, art, music, language, and other topics, Hofstadter doesn't so much drive a point home as he revels in the interconnectedness of all things in his own mind. But perhaps that's the point.

Review of 'Gödel, Escher, Bach : an eternal golden braid' on 'GoodReads'

No rating

The first part is hard theoretical mathematics, number theory and its relation with programming languages.

The second part is far easier to read, because it is about computer programs, and artificial intelligence. It is quite fun reading some now outdated concepts in AI, only very recently outdated thanks to DeepMind's Convolutional Neural Networks and its use in AlphaGo to beat the best humans players in the world.

Before every chapter there's a dialog with fantastic characters, with meta-commentary about the chapter.

All in all, it is not as impossible to finish as I expected =)

Review of 'Gödel, Escher, Bach : an eternal golden braid' on 'Goodreads'

2 stars

I should like this book. The subject matter covers things I have studied in depth and find interesting. The premise is something I mostly agree with. The writing is good enough to not get in the way and I like going on recursive tangents that may or may not add to the overall text (I'm looking at you Moby Dick). In spite of this it was not enjoyable at all.

It wasn't a matter of not getting it, I've slogged through Godel's paper and dug into technical aspects of many of the topics Hofstadter covers in the book. I even enjoyed working out the puzzles. I think it boils down to already having a similar working knowledge of the material covered and the presentation here did not provide any significant new illuminations to what I already knew. Maybe this is because the lessons from GEB have already permeated into things …

Review of 'Gödel, Escher, Bach' on Goodreads

4 stars

1) ''In Zen, too, we can see this preoccupation with the concept of transcending the system. For instance, the koan in which Tozan tells his monks that ''the higher Buddhism is not Buddha''. Perhaps, self-transcendence is even the central theme of Zen. A Zen person is always trying to understand more deeply what he is, by stepping more and more out of what he sees himself to be, by breaking every rule and convention which he perceives himself to be chained by # needless to say, including those of Zen itself. Somewhere along this elusive path may come enlightenment. In any case (as I see it), the hope is that by gradually deepening one's self-awareness, by gradually widening the scope of ''the system'', one will in the end come to a feeling of being at one with the entire universe.''

2) ''[...] This suggests a distinction that could be drawn …

Review of 'Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid' on 'LibraryThing'

5 stars

advice to other reviewers; if you've not read Hostader's 20th anniversary preface, please do. all he wanted/s to do i/was show how self-awareness, the sense of "I", grows out of self-reference. mathematically speaking, which H insists he is not about, observes in Bertrand Russell's Principia Mathematica, while trying to build a Maginot Line in math against "self-reference", lays the seeds for it's own refutation in favor of self-reference. returnreturnin as few words as possible: it's not about the substance, but the patterns.

avatar for ulf_der_freak

rated it

4 stars
avatar for Bhawthorne

rated it

4 stars
avatar for wild-green

rated it

5 stars
avatar for valen

rated it

5 stars
avatar for tflop

rated it

5 stars
avatar for ginkgo

rated it

3 stars
avatar for EricLawton

rated it

5 stars
avatar for jbaty

rated it

5 stars
avatar for Lwdd

rated it

5 stars
avatar for loppear

rated it

5 stars
avatar for faited

rated it

4 stars
avatar for lucasrizoli

rated it

5 stars
avatar for quirk

rated it

5 stars
avatar for inga-lovinde

rated it

4 stars
avatar for chris_st

rated it

5 stars
avatar for Lasu

rated it

5 stars
avatar for asmundg

rated it

5 stars
avatar for sifuCJC

rated it

3 stars
avatar for maxbittker

rated it

4 stars
avatar for Vincent

rated it

3 stars
avatar for localstatic

rated it

2 stars
avatar for nithinbekal

rated it

3 stars
avatar for moonmoonmoon

rated it

4 stars
avatar for ngs

rated it

5 stars
avatar for ianbishop

rated it

2 stars
avatar for chrisamaphone

rated it

4 stars
avatar for mjmenger

rated it

5 stars
avatar for Chigaze

rated it

5 stars
avatar for ssssam

rated it

2 stars
avatar for lbthomas

rated it

3 stars
avatar for thebbennett

rated it

4 stars
avatar for timhutton

rated it

5 stars
avatar for lukeg

rated it

5 stars
avatar for joeyh

rated it

5 stars
avatar for Fireblend

rated it

5 stars
avatar for vincekd

rated it

5 stars
avatar for joaotrindade

rated it

5 stars
avatar for kwm

rated it

5 stars
avatar for dotnich

rated it

5 stars
avatar for stinkingpig

rated it

2 stars
avatar for mattlehrer

rated it

5 stars
avatar for mattmerk

rated it

4 stars
avatar for cara-cara

rated it

4 stars
avatar for xianny

rated it

3 stars
avatar for JPo34

rated it

2 stars
avatar for arensb

rated it

5 stars
avatar for bondolo

rated it

4 stars
avatar for dfings

rated it

5 stars
avatar for ktabf

rated it

5 stars
avatar for karlo

rated it

5 stars
avatar for unwiredben

rated it

5 stars
avatar for cogmer

rated it

4 stars
avatar for Adem

rated it

5 stars
avatar for yashima

rated it

3 stars
avatar for rahulgopinath

rated it

5 stars
avatar for DavidLove

rated it

5 stars
avatar for lacop

rated it

5 stars
avatar for rototrav

rated it

4 stars
avatar for ixnu

rated it

5 stars
avatar for pneuma

rated it

5 stars
avatar for ToadyNerd

rated it

1 star
avatar for BojanB

rated it

5 stars
avatar for CatFoodHands

rated it

3 stars
avatar for s_l

rated it

4 stars
avatar for Psvensson

rated it

5 stars
avatar for Lwdd

rated it

5 stars
avatar for sirodoht

rated it

5 stars
avatar for sellout

rated it

5 stars
avatar for technodad

rated it

3 stars
avatar for advaitathreya

rated it

4 stars
avatar for linse

rated it

5 stars
avatar for pd-bomber

rated it

4 stars
avatar for torin

rated it

2 stars
avatar for chado

rated it

5 stars
avatar for CMGX9

rated it

4 stars
avatar for Jameson

rated it

4 stars
avatar for tjrourke

rated it

5 stars
avatar for oobisan

rated it

4 stars
avatar for FredJohansen@books.theunseen.city

rated it

5 stars
avatar for faithpeterson

rated it

5 stars
avatar for OmniJan

rated it

3 stars
avatar for guillevg

rated it

5 stars
avatar for pgenera

rated it

5 stars
avatar for eyolf

rated it

5 stars
avatar for TimMason

rated it

5 stars
avatar for markgalassi

rated it

5 stars
avatar for khperkins

rated it

4 stars
avatar for robbert

rated it

4 stars
avatar for gerwitz

rated it

5 stars
avatar for rmzetti

rated it

5 stars