5 ms·
This was a perspective altering read for me, and I still have some 200 pages to go. It is extremely dense, in the sense that there is just so much packed into e
by joshes 16y ago
This was a perspective altering read for me, and I still have some 200 pages to go. It is extremely dense, in the sense that there is just so much packed into each page, chapter and dialogue that you have to pace yourself.
So many times have I noticed Hofstadter making a play on his own words to prove a point about recursion or indirection or some other fundamental concept. It's truly a wonderful piece of work.
- baddox 16y agoI read it right after taking my first Discrete Math and Computation courses. My eyes were quickly opened to what computation and mathematics really are. The molecular biology stuff in the middle of the book got a bit long-toothed for my taste and I think the music part of his grand analogy was the weakest, but man was that a great book.
- JonnieCache 16y agoI too read this book shortly after doing my CompSci degree. His beautiful technique of explaining complex concepts through allegory made me finally understand a lot of stuff from my various Computation-related courses, that was opaque at the time. If I had read that book before I took the courses, I would have understood the courses a lot better. However if I had tried to read the book before taking the courses, I may well have not understood parts of the book properly. Deliciously, this kind of recursive, chicken-and-egg problem is an embodiment of some of the book's central concepts. Go and buy it now!