Rating: 
Summary: A must
Review: As a mathematician, I rate this one of the most profound books I have ever read along with Penrose's "The Emperor's New Mind",
Rating:
Summary: This is a great book!
Review: This book is, like I said above, great. I'm only 13 years old (no joke.) I was getting really sick of sci-fi one day and was looking for Joseph Heller books at our bookstore, when I spied this one. The title was what really grabbed me. Godel I had never heard of. Escher is (I think) the greatest artist that has ever lived, same for Bach only music. Also the subtitle, which compared it to the works of Lewis Carroll, who I think is a very good author and mathemetician (sp?). It took me two readings to fully comprehend this book. The translating of zen koans into the prepositional calculus explained in this book is both hard to understand (for me, at least) and interesting. This book didn't really change my life; the only book that has ever done that to me is maybe the Illuminatus! trology. But this was one of the best books that I have ever read.
Rating:
Summary: Stimulating. A tour-de-force disguised as a tour-de-farce.
Review: I've struggled through this book ... three times. The first, shortly after it came out. The second, immediately after the first. The third, several years later. Finally, I will reread it cover-to-cover soon after 15 more years of life experience. I do not exagerate to say that my perspective of the world has been altered by this work. My wife, knowing my feelings, had the book leather bound, as a birthday present, at a cost of six times the original price of the book. My copy is dog eared, with extensive margin notes, and pages torn and yellowed with use. Until I read this book I didn't know: * The shocking implications of Godel's Incompleteness Theorem. * The mathematical genius of Bach * That self-reference and self-replication are strange manifestations of the same central phenomenon. * That ant colonies and the mind are oddly similar. * That important achievements in many disciplines have the same paradoxical seed. * That difficult presentations could be so much FUN to read. This book is aerobics for the mind. If you enjoy thinking, read this book.
Rating:
Summary: Dazzling!
Review: I was given G.E.B. as a gift in 1981 but didn't get around to reading it for the first time for two years. I've made up for it since by reading it twice. Each time another layer is peeled away and I marvel at the depth and range of the author's mind. Don't consider yourself 'well read' until you read this book.
Rating:
Summary: I gave it to my professor
Review: I was in awe of the book when I read it. But to be honest it was the title that enticed me to read it. I was refferd to it by books on chaos theory and cosmology. The manner in which Hofstadter approaches the complex idea of looped systems is what impressed me the most. Not "being good in maths" and the like is simply no excuse for one not to at least attempt to read the book. Beware! Read it during the day most certainly not for bed-time reading!
Rating: 
Summary: An Ethereal Goofy Brain
Review: I must accept it. I was fascinated with this book once. That was some time ago. But then I realized what everything standed for. And I started to turn very critical against it. "What is this book about?" one should ask. The sad answer Hofstadter would give: "A statement of my religion" (p. xxi) And that's exactly what the book is all about: mixing all the author's interests (AI, recusion, mathematics, Escher paintings, Bach music, computer languages, etc.) to create a "cult" product. It is no coincidence that a lot of the readers claim they've read the book so many times; this behavior is in close relation with attempts of creating "life answers" or "religions" like this one. But what is this religion about? That's the problem: when one starts interpreting relations between different systems in terms of discovering "truths", as the author does, --instead of taking them as what they are-- one falls in mysticism ! and obsurantism. That's why the book has attracted such an audience: not because its scientific or artistic contributions (it does not have!) but due to its childish belief in a divine element in the behavior of systems. Just look at the way different topics are discussed: in a very "simplistic" or "happy" way. It avoids to mention all the pesimistic implicances. You can check this in every page of the book, even looking at the bibliography: *not a single* classic, scholar treatise; all the mentioned books are either bestsellers or "strange" books, but never profound, deep. --"A personal, superficial book of religion, diguised as a book of instruction, disguised as a book of entertainment"-- if you know what I mean...
Rating:
Summary: This book can bend your brain, and leave it changed forever
Review: A few years ago, a friend lent me this book, and I started to read. 24 hours later, with no sleep and little food, I'd finished it. Each concept in this book was presented in such a clear way, and leading from one thread to the next. A wonderful work, giving part-time and amature philosophers, mathematitians, and computer scientists something to think about! Everyone should read this book at least once. *smile*
Rating:
Summary: Nothing Short of mind-changing, Darwin & Newton beware!
Review: Being a primative philosopher, a genetist, a naturalist and a teacher of the Gifted and Talented in rural Alaska, I use this book to seperate those who know and those who understand. The beauty of mathematics, the realism of our discovered systems and symbols makes this book the most significant work I use in class. One out of 10 slog through this work and become masters of their own thought. I have bought 6 copies thus far and have ordered my 7th all given to teenagers who showed potential. They get passed on and become the seed for a greater consience of this great being. May God bless this book and the lives it has and will touch. Ahabonook (The man who surprizes, Yupik Eskimo)
Rating:
Summary: Brilliant and fun!
Review: What a terrific book! I'm only halfway through, but am searching for a copy so i can finish reading it. It's truly a tremendous book. I started it thinking I'd learn some more about math (I was introduced to the book by a math teacher) but found way more than that. I literally see the world in a different way, and am constantly thinking about the ideas presented in GEB. It's an intellectual journey you'll never quite recover from. Absolutley Brilliant!
Rating: 
Summary: Worth reading
Review: I just finished reading this book as part of my Sophmore Math 2 AP class in high school. It was very interesting and insightful. Some of the ways that Hofstadter described certain things were brilliant. It is definitely worth reading. You will learn many things that you never even dared to think about before. Once in while it gets a bit boring, but overall it is fascinating.
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