Review: Book 50 "Gödel, Escher, Bach", by Douglas R. Hoftstadter

Simultaneously one of the most incomprehensible and fascinating books I've read. This is a real workout for the brain even though I understood about 5% of it (if that?)
Have you read it? What are your thoughts?

[@andrewsimpson4786]

I understood a 1/3, got the gist of a 1/3 and a 1/3 went over my head. The interspersed conversations with A&T were enjoyable, made me laugh anyway and set-up the next points well. Dated? Yeah in some ways, but I don't think it makes it unrelatable nor takes away from the principles. I came to it via Metzinger [Ego Tunnel], Clark [Surfing Uncertainty], led on to Dennet [Brainstorms] and Holland [Hidden Order].

[@litwithcharles7780]

Your percentages are better than mine! I understood 5% (maybe), got the gist of 20% and 3/4 went over my head. And yet, I still really enjoyed it!

[@SlavaPunta]

I have the 2nd (or 3rd?) edition, where he backtracks his stance on a spell checker being too complicated to be practical, but yet made a point to double down on how a grammer check would always be fantasy due to its complexity of word context. But I agree the book is a (painful) slog to get through. I've always described it as "my favorite book that I can't recommend to anyone." But here I am, 20 years later still thinking about it. My main issue is how bad it's aged. He makes so many references to music (or art) I'm just not familiar with. Or being lost in PC terminology that never caught on. I believe he was describing a "mouse" or "motherboard" or "modem", but he didn't use those terms because it predates the lexicon. It's challenging the way a foriegn language book is. It's not so much about the concepts being too hard. It just not in English. My introduction to it was simply "it's the philosophy of the Matrix (1999)." And after reading it, you can see exactly where parts were pulled straight from the pages. The Alice in Wonderland references. What is real? Can you program consciousness? Can an A.I. improve itself or properly evolve? There is no flag (spoon).

[@andrewsimpson4786]

Also see, obviously, Baudrillard's 'Simulation and Simulacra' for Matrixness!