Comments on: Victim of The Brain

Victim of The Brain

empath — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 05:44:26 -0800

Victim of the Brain A 'docudrama' about Godel, Escher and Bach author, Douglas Hofstadter, and philosopher Dan Dennett produced in 1988. I'm not sure how to describe it, other than incredibly strange and fascinating.

By: empath

empath — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 05:45:41 -0800

I don't know if you can tell from recent fpps, but my new internet addiction is searching Google Video for "Documentary", filtering by duration=long. There's a ton of great stuff there.

By: empath

empath — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 05:46:38 -0800

And i botched the link: Here's the correct link.

By: Mach5

Mach5 — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 06:15:34 -0800

awesome, now i know what to do when i get to work today. are you a strange loop too?

By: Jofus

Jofus — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 06:29:24 -0800

I've always wondered what Hofstadter looked like. Another mystery solved by Metafilter.

By: ewkpates

ewkpates — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 06:30:38 -0800

little bit frustrated that I can't watch the video at work. little bit more frustrated that people post links that they "are not sure how to describe". little bit unacceptable.

By: empath

empath — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 06:31:54 -0800

Um, if you watched it, you would probably understand. I think if you read the wiki articles about Hofstadter and Dennett and the GEB link, you'd get the gist of what the subject matter will be. But the movie itself is really weird.

By: BeerGrin

BeerGrin — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 06:33:33 -0800

"Godel, Escher and Bach" is my favorite brain exercise. If I feel like I am getting stagnant or to set in my ways of thinking I go back to trying to read it. I love it, but I will admit that much of what Hofstadter says is way out of my league.

By: painquale

painquale — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 06:41:58 -0800

Hah, I've seen this before and it's great and totally weird. I got I Am a Strange Loop in the mail from Amazon yesterday, and I'm going to see Hofstadter give a talk in a couple of weeks. Looking forward to it.

By: Ethereal Bligh

Ethereal Bligh — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 06:52:15 -0800

Hofstadter is my hero. I'd love to meet him, but I'd probably get cold feet just like I did with Murray Gell-Mann. I like Dennett quite a bit, too, but I wasn't nervous talking with him.

By: notsnot

notsnot — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 07:13:41 -0800

Hofstadter is awesome. He was probably the only person quirky enough to replace Martin Gardner at SciAm. GEB is my personal philosophical touchstone.

By: elmono

elmono — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 08:17:28 -0800

Wonderful!. Thanks a lot.

By: Ethereal Bligh

Ethereal Bligh — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 08:30:52 -0800

"He was probably the only person quirky enough to replace Martin Gardner at SciAm." Yes, but he was controversial because of his political/social activism in his columns. Which I thought was great. But I think that's why his tenure was so short.

By: BlackLeotardFront

BlackLeotardFront — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 13:06:12 -0800

Awesome, I'll have to fave this to watch it when I actually finish GEB. Great book.

By: stormygrey

stormygrey — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 14:34:37 -0800

GEB is the only book I have ever not been able to finish. It still mocks me on the shelf. The issue is I just can't skip over parts I don't get. DAMN!

By: BitterOldPunk

BitterOldPunk — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 14:43:24 -0800

I like the idea of a discussion of Hofstadter taking place within this hive mind. Reading I Am a Strange Loop now, and it's exhilarating, even if much of it flies leagues above my little pointy head.

By: lukemeister

lukemeister — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 20:38:25 -0800

This will sound like a troll, but it's not. I've somehow managed not to read a word by Hofstadter, despite being in the target demographic. Can someone clue me in why I should read his books?

By: litfit

litfit — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 02:09:38 -0800

This will sound like a troll, but it's not. I've somehow managed not to read a word by Hofstadter, despite being in the target demographic. Can someone clue me in why I should read his books?

I blame him for inspiring me to leave a gainful career in software engineering to return to school and do a degree in linguistics. I still write software, but women think I'm a lot more interesting now. Maybe you'd like to be more interesting to women, is that a good enough reason?

By: lukemeister

lukemeister — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 05:33:23 -0800

litfit: That's a great answer. I'll try Goedel, Escher, Bach and then see what my wife thinks :-)

By: notsnot

notsnot — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 05:45:51 -0800

Stormygrey, I've got the background to understand it, mostly, but occasionally skipped small bits. Push Forward - read it!