Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid

By Douglas R Hofstadter

Synopsis: Douglas Hofstadter’s book is concerned directly with the nature of “maps” or links between formal systems. However, according to Hofstadter, the formal system that underlies all mental activity transcends the system that supports it. If life can grow out of the formal chemical substrate of the cell, if consciousness can emerge out of a formal system of firing neurons, then so too will computers attain human intelligence. Gödel Escher and Bach is a wonderful exploration of fascinating ideas at the heart of cognitive science: meaning, reduction, recursion, and much more.

Winner of the 1980 Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction
Winner of the 1980 National Book Award for Science

Published: 1979 | ISBN-13: 978-0465026562

Author’s mini-bio: Douglas Richard Hofstadter is an American professor of cognitive science whose research focuses on the sense of “I”, consciousness, analogy-making, artistic creation, literary translation, and discovery in mathematics and physics. He is best known for his book Gödel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid, first published in 1979. It won both the Pulitzer Prize for general non-fiction and a National Book Award for Science. – From Wikipedia

Scientific American Interviews Author

For the same reason I loved Magister Ludi. And the joy of the brain too! Probably why I became a Neuroscientist. – Christine Jasoni from her 10 Books Selected by a Neuroscientist

NYU Book Review (pdf)
New York Review of Books Book Review
GF Brandenburg’s Blog Book Review
NYTimes Book Review