
6 month read-through/discussion of Gödel, Escher, Bach starting 1/17 on Reddit - qrush
http://www.reddit.com/r/GEB/comments/nmy4p/starting_a_readthrough_january_17/
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presidentender
I loved GEB, but since reading it (and jumping in and re-reading parts here
and there when it strikes my fancy) I've come to the conclusion that it's a
perfectly laid Dunning-Kruger trap which specifically ensnares people like me.
I am not as smart as Hofstadter, and I know it, and so I'll never be sure I've
actually understood the meat of the message.

I think I get strange loops, recursion, self-reference and the metaphor of the
anthill. I still think I'm missing something with breaking the record players,
but based on my understanding it's a metaphor for incompleteness.

~~~
haberman
I had the opposite reaction: I lost faith in the book's analytical process
only ten pages in, when Hofstadter claimed that Bach's canon was a "strange
loop" simply because it modulates to a higher key. Sure, if you keep doing
this you can get to the same key, _an octave higher_ , but that's only because
pitch itself is periodic, repeating the same notes every octave. There's
nothing unique or mysterious about Bach's canon in this regard; anything that
modulates up a step has the same property (for example, the chorus to "Mandy"
by Barry Manilow).

I think the far more interesting observation is that octaves in music work
this way, where we as humans somehow perceive frequencies in a 2:1 ratio as
"the same, but different." A 440 and A 880 aren't the same pitch, and we can
clearly perceive the difference between them, and yet the seem "the same" to
the point that we give them the same letter and think of them as the same. I
find that very interesting and slightly mysterious.

Anyway, since music is my area of expertise (as opposed to the other things
described in the book) I lost faith that his explanations of the other subject
material wouldn't have similarly sloppy thinking. The impression I got was
that, in an effort to weave an interesting and engaging narrative, he was too
quick to see things as instances of these fanciful concepts like "strange
loops."

~~~
zinkem
He's discussing our perception of the tones, you might want to check out this
entry on wikpedia to understand what he's referring to:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shepard_tone>

This is a common concept in music synthesis, as you can create an endlessly
rising 'melody' by repeating only 1 octave of some properly constructed
timbres. This is the 'strange loop' he's referring to.

~~~
haberman
Bach's canon is not a Shepard tone. A Shepard tone would have been a more
credible example of a "strange loop" than Bach's canon. But "Godel, Escher,
Shepard" doesn't have the same ring to it.

~~~
zinkem
He actually does discuss Shepard Tones and the Shepard Scale in the book, and
explains how he thinks they are related to Bach's compositions.

Near the end of chapter 20, there is an example of a harmony that, when
looped, creates the illusion of an endlessly rising melody.

In this harmony, the loudness of each note in the melodies rises and falls so
that the lower melodies feed into the the higher melodies and ultimately fade
out. In our brains, we hear this as an endlessly rising melody.

------
tseabrooks
This seems like one of the first great "Social" ideas I've ever heard. For me,
personally of course, facebook, foursquare, social shopping, etc all solve
problems I don't have.

However a sort of online book group is something that I might like and would
solve a real problem I do have. It may be to niche to make a company out of.
That said, what sorts of things would a site (platform?) need in order to be
successful at creating guided, curated, experiences such as a book group.

~~~
jmilloy
I think forums have served this problem for over a decade. Voting systems on
comments and nested comments like slashdot and here and reddit are just an
improvement on forums. So what are these formats lacking for you?

(I agree they could probably be improved by specific changes for online book
groups)

~~~
tseabrooks
That's a good question; and is really the heart of my question... What do we
need to put together to create something good for this... I would invision is
as akin to a meetup group only virtual. Here's a quick list of things you
might want (With no claims about whether or not they already exist):

1) Real time communication along with some async comm.

    
    
       -Real time comm needs to be archived in a readable form
    

2) Method for an instructor(leader) to create 'outlines' and have those bullet
points contain conversations.

3) The ability to "sign up" for a book / experience.

    
    
       -When we get enough signups and a leader we schedule a start date.
    

4) A method for people who want to participate at a later date to feel
involved and "step though" the old forum / chats at the speed they happened.

    
    
       -A way for slow people or later people to use the site without spoilers
    
       -A way for two groups doing the same book at different speeds to work together.
    

5) [random idea] Make users anonymous to each other... Except for the
moderator.

6) Track books participated in.

7) [random idea] Does this idea make more sense as a specialized learning
system for literature courses?

All the ideas I have right now.

~~~
spelunker
Shoot, Google Wave probably solves/solved half of those. I always considered
the platform being good for a pen-and-paper RPG, but a virtual book club would
probably work too!

A starting point, anyway :-)

~~~
tseabrooks
I thought about google wave when I was typing that. I actually use google wave
pretty regularly with friends. We're setting up a server to house our personal
apache Wave deployment now that google is shutting it down.

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martinkallstrom
This was the last book my grandfather gave me before he passed away a few
years ago, in translation to Swedish. Back then I was completely unaware that
it is regarded as seminal work.

He was an engineer just as I am, but I always admired that his bookshelf was
brim full of knowledge from completely different areas, spanning psychology,
biology, medicine, art and music.

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mmaunder
How do you know someone's read GEB? They tell you.

~~~
irahul
<snark> How do you know someone hasn't read GEB? They pass snarky remarks when
someone mentions they have read GEB. </snark>

That aside, offering to help people with a difficult book is different from
flaunting having read the book.

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DanielBMarkham
I've been meaning to review GEB on <http://hn-books.com> \-- great, once-in-a-
lifetime book. Kind of a cross between a college course, a game, a puzzle, and
the work of a madman.

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rhodin
It's the kind of book you can spend a few days reading or a life time, just
like "Zen and the art of motorcycle repair".

I've read half of it in 8 years, so maybe it's time to redo the whole process
from beginning to end.

~~~
lkozma
Just like ZMM, GED is also the kind of book that tends to split people into
those that love it and those that hate it. Personally, I loved GED and hated
ZMM. Similarly, I know people who find GED overrated, pompous and shallow.

~~~
loboman
Yeah, I think it's overrated, pompous and shallow. And I understand it
perfectly, having studied the subject (at least the maths part) from real
sources.

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bch
Sweet, sweet, sweet. I know I'm not the only one who's "read it", but hasn't
actually finished it.

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brianwillis
It's such a shame there isn't a Kindle/ePub/PDF version. I guess I'm off to
kill another tree.

~~~
redthrowaway
There's a pdf on tpb, so there should be a legitimate version somewhere.

~~~
preek
I have the original as hardcover, but also wanted to be able to read on the go
on the iPad, so I downloaded the ebook.

It's a scan with OCR. Unfortunately the OCR is bad on many parts of the page -
random occurences of %, ' and other characters are common. Also some words are
totally unreadable.

Overall, I still read sometimes on the iPad, but having to go back to the
hardcover if I'm totally lost.

~~~
redthrowaway
I just noticed that after I downloaded. Pretty unfortunate.

Oh well, one more dead tree won't hurt anyone.

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ISloop
This is awesome. GEB has been sitting on my bookshelf for about a year but I
never got around to reading it. I'll give it a shot, and it's great to know
there's a community out there available for help.

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JoyxBen
If someone wants to start one for Hofstadter's most recent mega-book, Le Ton
Beau De Marot, count me in.

~~~
riffraff
I don't think it's the most recent, isn't 'i am a strange loop' a subsequent
one? Anyway, I read it and it's awesome. It is a much more personal book than
GEB though, and it's easy to grow weary of the poem tranations after the
twentyeth, but it's a great reading.

~~~
JoyxBen
I meant most recent "mega-book" since its a brick like GEB (but not sure of
the size of "I am a strange loop", so maybe that's a brick too)

I can see how the poem translations can get weary, but they do a brilliant job
of illustrating his ideas about translation way beyond poetry. I love how he
generalizes the idea of translation into all sorts of non-language domains
(i.e. translating ice skating skills to roller blading). Now to get past the
current set of poems onto the next chapter ;)

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zalthor
Brilliant way to start the year off. I first got my hand on this book when I
was in high school and was bit overwhelmed. I read it again in college, but
again, I don't think I really "got it". Getting into a group read/discussion
on this book would by simply PERFECT!

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SonicSoul
hah.. GEB has been staring me down from my top shelf for 5 years now. I wasn't
expecting to crack it open until retirement time (20 years from now?) but
hey.. maybe i'll speed this up.

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oz
I got a copy a few months ago, but I've only read some of the new foreword so
far. This is great news.

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MarkPNeyer
careful; some ideas in this book will fuck with you:

[http://www.reddit.com/r/BipolarReddit/comments/l7nij/interes...](http://www.reddit.com/r/BipolarReddit/comments/l7nij/interesting_humorous_not_tragic_manic_stories/c2qiqlj?context=3)

~~~
rmc
Reminds me of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, in which the
protagonist has a similar problem.

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WhatsHisName
This is such a awful book. Pure hipster material.

~~~
JonnieCache
Is this a joke? I can only guess that you tried to read it, and didn't
understand it.

~~~
WhatsHisName
I went to the same grad school as the author did and got a PhD in physics
there. Most of the professors I knew who taught the guy said the same thing to
me about the book. It's just awful.

~~~
defen
If you treat the book as an experience rather than a tome containing the
answer to life the universe and everything, it's quite enjoyable.

~~~
omarchowdhury
Exactly. Reading this book looking for those answers or looking for validation
of notions you already hold is just going to lead to frustration.

