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Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid Paperback – February 5, 1999

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Douglas R. Hofstadter (Author)
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Douglas R. Hofstadter (Author)
4.5 out of 5 stars 467 customer reviews
#1 Best Sellerin Artificial Intelligence & Semantics
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Product Details

  • Paperback: 824 pages
  • Publisher: Basic Books; 20 Anv edition (February 5, 1999)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0465026567
  • ISBN-13: 978-0465026562
  • Product Dimensions: 1.2 x 5.8 x 9.2 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 2.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (467 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,406 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Top Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 starsWay out of my comfort zone, but still great.
By frumiousb on June 2, 2000
Format: Paperback Verified Purchase
I'm here to witness that even people as seriously math-challenged as I am can participate in this wonderful book. It took me a *long* time to read-- I flipped back and forth, beat the pages up, asked my more math-oriented friends for help. I spent forever trying to solve the MU exercise. It was worth it. I still feel like I understood parts of it only in intuitive flashes, but those flashes showed me a room more interesting than most of the well-lit chambers ordinary books provide.
Reading Godel, Escher, Bach is like joining a club. People who see you reading it will open spontaneous conversations and often gift you with unexpected insights. (I had a fascinating conversation with a total stranger about Godel's theorem.)
Wish I could give more than five stars.
7 Comments 471 people found this helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No Sending feedback...
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5.0 out of 5 starsA Profound Meditation On Human Creativity
By A Customer on October 1, 2000
Format: Paperback
Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid debates, beautifully, the question of consciousness and the possibility of artificial intelligence. It is a book that attempts to discover the true meaning of "self."
As the book introduces the reader to cognitive science, the author draws heavily from the world of art to illustrate the finer points of mathematics. The works of M.C. Escher and J.S. Bach are discussed as well as other works in the world of art and music. Topics presented range from mathematics and meta-mathematics to programming, recursion, formal systems, multilevel systems, self-reference, self-representation and others.
Lest you think Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid, to be a dry and boring book on a dry and boring topic, think again. Before each of the book's twenty chapters, Hofstadter has included a witty dialogue, in which Achilles, the Tortoise, and friends discuss various aspects that will later be examined by Hofstadter in the chapter to follow.
In writing these wonderful dialogues, Hofstadter created and entirely new form of art in which concepts are presented on two different levels simultaneously: form and content. The more obvious level of content presents each idea directly through the views of Achilles, Tortoise and company. Their views are sometimes right, often wrong, but always hilariously funny. The true beauty of this book, however, lies in the way Hofstadter interweaves these very ideas into the physical form of the dialogue. The form deals with the same mathematical concepts discussed by the characters, and is more than vaguely reminiscent of the musical pieces of Bach and printed works of Escher that the characters mention directly in their always-witty and sometimes hilarious, discussions.Read more ›
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2.0 out of 5 starsToo long, misleading title, pretentious, and the dialogues are unnecessary. But...
By Dan on May 12, 2016
Format: Paperback
I received this book as a graduation present a decade ago and just recently got around to reading it. Let’s just say it was not what I expected. I’ll start with what I liked about GEB and then move on to the much longer list of things I didn’t like.

I liked Hofstadter’s search for the seat of consciousness, in humans, ant colonies, and (as he attempts to claim) self-referential formal systems. The discussion of this application to computer science and artificial intelligence was tremendously interesting, though a bit outdated. This subject was, I felt, the core aim of the book, though the route there was extremely, unnecessarily, circuitous.

The last few chapters delved deeply, VERY deeply, into these extremely important topics. Up until that point, however, I was confused as to where Hofstadter was leading me and then when I finally finished the book, I was confused as to why the preceding 500+ pages were necessary to arrive there.

My biggest qualm with this book is its length. There is no reason this book needed to be over 700 pages long. I should have viewed the 23-page-long preface to the 20th anniversary edition as a warning of Hofstadter’s unnecessarily verbose, pompous style. I can sum up the preface in one sentence: “Nobody understands what this book is about, but rather than try to clarify I’ll just painstakingly detail how the book came to be.” Cutting out the unnecessary dialogues (discussed further below) would have significantly reduced this volume without any substantive difference in content. It still wouldn’t be enough though.Read more ›
2 Comments 36 people found this helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No Sending feedback...
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5.0 out of 5 starsEscape from predestination
By Curtis L. Wilbur on December 14, 1999
Format: Paperback
It seems highly appropriate that Douglas Hofstatder should re-release his epic work now. His central theme plays so eloquently in this place and time: Every system folds in on itself, be it physics, mathematics, or any form of language. All these systems are inherently self-referential, and as such, take on a life of their own. A life their creators could never imagine. Many reviewers have focused on the explicit messages of the book, their likes or dislikes, but the great beauty of this work lies within the realm of what it does not say. It is, no doubt, the most difficult book I have ever read, and I have to admit it took me several false starts to finally get through the thing. It is so incredibly deep - one cannot simply wade through it like a sci-fi novel. But if you take your time, spend, say about a year on it - work through the TNT exercises, discover the hidden messages the author has left, read the bibliography - and at some point it will strike you; the incredible richness of the message. The book, you, the world, all of it IS open. The pages of this universe are blank, unwritten. Dr. Hofstadter has woven a message of eternal optimism, one that transcends even the infinite depth to the tapestry of topics spread before us: The great freedom that we, nature's most remarkable matrix, are part of a future without destiny. Even if we were created, any purpose impressed upon us is lost in a cacophany of unexpected relationships. Deterministic, yet infinitely complex and unpredictable. We can never understand anything completely, and thus every life can experience the magic of observing that which cannot be explained. This is a book of wonders, and you will never regret the time you spent on it.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 starsand I loved it so much I wore out my original copy

My first book from this writer, and I loved it so much I wore out my original copy.

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Great item. Prompt shipment. Thank you.

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5.0 out of 5 starsFive Stars

This was a gift.

Published 18 days ago by Kathy Pentecost
5.0 out of 5 starsWhat a book!

A must-read for every math enthusiastic.
Tokk me a long time since it's a bit complicated, but it's worth every minute of reading.

Published 19 days ago by Sagi
3.0 out of 5 starsin love with his brilliance

On reading Iain Mcgilchrist' Master and his Emissary, I see the trouble with this sort of book. Douglas R. Hofstadter is a classic left brain sort of guy. Read more

Published 2 months ago by a badly positioned hole near centre of chariot wheel
5.0 out of 5 starsFive Stars

Amazing book

Published 2 months ago by pranav chokda
5.0 out of 5 starsFive Stars

Wonderful!!!

Published 3 months ago by Peter Liu
5.0 out of 5 starsDense book of wonders

There is sooo much content in this book it's going to take my whole life to even begin to understand.

Very well written and super interesting though, love it.

Published 3 months ago by Amazon Customer

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