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I Am a Strange Loop
Douglas R. Hofstadter
0465030785
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"For anyone like me who almost became a cognitive scientist and studies and deals with how we learn and think and feel and sort of from other perspectives, this book is a great place to start.

So the title of I am a Strange Loop, which is appropriate given that the book is about self-referential, self-perceptual emergence of consciousness, is the idea that I — which isn't necessarily me or you or the author of the book but every consciousness that interacts with all these other consciousnesses on earth — is a strange loop, that the nature of having self-awareness, of having higher awareness, consciousness, self-consciousness. Part of the book's point is to look at all these different ways of looking at and describing the same thing is the strange loop thing and not just single strange loops within each of our minds but strange loops that are also inhabiting the minds of those who know us, who've heard about us, who've interacted with us more or less closely. It's a lot to describe all in one sentence or paragraph.

This is a book that I read every word, every page of, and enjoyed everything about the book, every little chunk, every little meandering, every little interesting analogy or metaphor that he uses to take you in a new direction or tie back to his earlier points.

Who would I recommend I am a Strange Loop to? Probably to anyone who reads the first chapter and finds it at all interesting. I believe the first chapter tackles in his own style the question that I think you come upon in other books that I've read. Certainly A Slim Volume by Daniel Dedit begins this way, looking at what has consciousness, what sorts of beings have consciousness. I think that his style of convincing you vehemently and very persuasively of his perspective without making you feel like you're being hoodwinked, without making you feel like you're being derided if you don't go on board, I think that really gets going in that first chapter.

I would unquestionably give I am a Strange Loop five stars 'cause of the nature of the tasks that he takes on."

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