Reviews for Gödel, Escher, Bach & The Physics of Consciousness

[Kamataat]

"Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid" by Douglas. R. Hofstadter and "The Physics of Consciousness" by Evan Harris Walker.

The second one sounds dubious, but I'd like a few opinions from people who know more about science than me. The reason why I don't want to go by Amazon reviews is that I trust that the people on PF a more scientifically minded.

Thanks in advance.

- Kamataat

 

[DaveC426913]

"Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid" by Douglas. R. Hofstadter is part science, part philosophy and part art.

I absolutely loved his "Metamagical Themas", and read it several times, but again, part science, part philosophy and part art.

You won't necessarily learn a lot of physics from these books, but they may well inspire you and engender a sense of wonder and joy in what you do.

 

[Kamataat]

Thanks, DaveC426913. I think I will read Hofstadter's book then.

Does anyone know anything about "The Physics of Consciousness"? It doesn't look good to me, because on the back it says that the theory that Walker (the author) proposes answers questions like "What is the nature of consciousness, of will?", "What is the source of material reality?" and "What is God?". As far as I know, physics can't answer these (at least yet), not to mention that the existence of God isn't based on any sound physical theories. Can somebody more knowledgeable in physics help me out? Is Walker a quack?

- Kamataat

 

[C0mmie]

Godel, Escher, Bach is an excellent book, I'm about half way through it. If you want a good book on consciousness, I recommend "The Quest for Consciousness," by Koch. It has a very good, structured, analytical approach. It's meant to be more of a textbook, but it's not a difficult read. Also, it was published in 2004, so the material is very recent.

 

[fourier jr]

GEB won a pulitzer when it came out, so that should be some incidation of how good it is. i read it last summer & i thought it was very cool.

 

[Kamataat]

Tnx, will check the book by Koch.