I Am a Strange Loop @ richardeward.com

I Am a Strange Loop
by Douglas R. Hofstadter
from Basic Books

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Customer Reviews:

• Avg. Customer Rating: 3.5 / 5.0

• "I" is not sure Hofstadter gets that "I am not "I""
  Fans of Hofstadter's style of writing may be pleased to have another tome to wander through, but fans of his ideas, such as I am, may be disappointed. In this book, DH attempts to focus on the question of identity: who or what am "I". DH firmly rejects both religious dualism and the pseudo-scientific dualism of Chalmers and others. Instead, DH calls upon the recursive loops he explored with us in GEB to expose identity for what it is: an emergent property of perceptual cognition turned in on itself.more info

• Not much new, entertaining but repetitive
  "I am a strange loop" is a book that showers the reader with metaphors, some amusing, some challenging, some facetious, some rather vague. What they all have in common is that they constantly reiterate the theory of self that is succinctly stated in the title, and even the most elaborate one, concerning Gödel's analysis of Russell's Principia Mathematica, eventually leaves you just where you started. At the outset you may feel that Hofstadter will elaborate on his theory through his analogies, or... more info

• I Am A Strange Loop
  How real is X to you...the moment you start taking X for granted, then it would seem you would consider X's reality highly dubious.
  This, a book of analogies and metaphors, presents a plethora of academic notions in a down to earth way, spinning science subjects such as physics, mathematics at the logical level, chemistry, psychology, humanities, and a touch of theology, to describe the human experience, which Hofstadter calls a Strange loop. He brings in a lot of his humble personality and subtle... more info

• chatty and personal, rather disappointing
  Once again, Hofstadter brings his unusual and very personal style to a serious subject. As with the title, "I" is a major player here, with stories, ruminations and specifics on what he thinks as a conscious human and a researcher. In many cases, I felt like we were almost in a dialog together.
  The book is too long and repetitious, with its essence only a few key points. There is a complex thread on KG, incompleteness, Russell and how all that applies to looks and being inside and outside the system.... more info

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