Gödel, Escher, Bach
Douglas Hofstadter
347 people recommended it in 106 threads, 2007–2026.
2 of those were in the last year.
88 commenters pushed back on it — worth reading the threads.
What people on Hacker News said
I devoured it at the time, and it fired my imagination for many years later.
Gödel, Escher, Bach awakened my intellectual curiosity about formal systems and other autistic modes of beauty as a teenager.
The book is somewhat life changing, in the questions that it asks. You might find yourself thinking about things differently, such as what it is to be conscious, can we ever achieve artificial intelligence, is there such a thing as fate, how was J.S. Bach able to produce such stunning compositions, etc.
If you've never it I recommend Godel Escher Bach : An Eternal Golden Braid, as it also likes to play with Buddhism.
For me: * Godel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid by Douglas Hofstadter
Godel Escher, Bach - (Recursion, but not from a software perspective. Its a glorious book that will change the way you think about recursion.)
I am of the generation that fixated upon GEB as some sort of deep wisdom, and I have a nostalgic fondness for it.
And on Amazon
Livre immortel
Il faut avoir un bon sens de mathématiques et de l'anglais pour apprécier les phrases super-bien construites. Si c'est le cas ce livre est un bijou sans comparaison. Les paradoxes mathématiques inhérent dans la langue même dont on décrit la mathématique est clairement mis en avant. Et les liens avec l'art, que ça soit les dessins paradoxaux d'Escher ou la musique auto-référente de Bach, sont captivants.
H Seigle · verified purchase · 5/5
Fantastic Book
It's amazing how much one can get out of this book. It covers pretty much everything... like all things. While I don't agree with everything in there, it's very fascinating and a fun read. It's one of those books where you can flip to any page and find a fantastic little gem. In saying that though you will want to read it cover to cover, as you can lose a bit of context jumping around. It's a book that tends to be recommended a lot to programmers, but I bought it for my wife when she was studying psychology and she loved it!
Anon · verified purchase · 5/5
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