Gödel Escher Bach - Eternal Golden Braid

Last week I finished reading a book written by Douglas Hofstadter about 20 years ago. I picked it up by accident while scavenging around Borders and I was immediately charmed. The book is no easy reading, it took me over 6 months to chew my way through its 800 pages, but it is a warmly recommended reading for anybody who is interested in the mind, life, math, music and even art. There are several main themes "braided" through the book. One is Gödels incompleteness theorem, how it was reached, and its implications on the philosophy of mathematics and natural numbers. Hofstadter also talks about strange loops - phenomenons that appear when two separate but loosely interacting systems start affecting each other. He believes that our own consciousness and sense of "self" is based on such strange loops. Very exciting and fascinating thought that I feel is worth exploring further, and even trying to simulate (in one of my countless models).

And - same writer has another book out, written pretty recently (2007) called "I am a Strange loop". Guess if I'm eager to put my hands on it!