Kurt Gdel was an intellectual giant. His Incompleteness Theorem turned not only mathematics but also the whole world of science and philosophy on its head. Shattering hopes that logic would, in the end, allow us a complete understanding of the universe, Gdel's theorem also raised many provocative questions: What are the limits of rational thought? Can we ever fully understand the machines we build? Or the inner workings of our own minds? How should mathematicians proceed in the absence of complete certainty about their results? Equally legendary were Gdel's eccentricities, his close friendship with Albert Einstein, and his paranoid fear of germs that eventually led to his death from self-starvation. Now, in the first book for a general audience on this strange and brilliant thinker, John Casti and Werner DePauli bring the legend to life.
Godel: A Life Of Logic, The Mind, And Mathematics
and over 1.5 million other books are available for Amazon Kindle . Learn more
| ||||||||||||||||||||
Did you know you can trade in your old books for an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card to spend on the things you want? Visit the Books Trade-In Store for more details. Learn more. |
Book Description
Product details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
More About the Author
Discover books, learn about writers, and more.
Product Description
About the Author
John L. Casti, a member of the faculty of both the Santa Fe Institute and the Technical Unviersity of Vienna, has written numerous acclaimed popular scinece books, including "Would-be Worlds, Five Golden Rules," and "The Cambridge Quintet." Werner DePauli is University Assistant and Oberrat at the Institute of Statistics and Computer Science of the University of Vienna. He is the author of several books in German about Godel.
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
First Sentence
There is absolutely no doubt that Godel is the world's greatest living logician; indeed, eminent thinkers such as Hermann Weyl and John von Neumann have declared that he is definitely the greatest logician since Leibniz, or even since Aristotle. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
There is absolutely no doubt that Godel is the world's greatest living logician; indeed, eminent thinkers such as Hermann Weyl and John von Neumann have declared that he is definitely the greatest logician since Leibniz, or even since Aristotle. Read the first page
Explore More
Concordance
Browse Sample PagesConcordance
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful
By Cito
Format:Paperback
Casti, a well known science popularizer, gives in this book an excellent account of the life and work of Czech-born mathematician Kurt Gödel.
Gödel's Theorem had a profound impact in the 1930's and has been recently used to argue that artificial intelligence is out of reach for computers (see Penrose's "The shadows of the mind").
You might also enjoy reading "Gödel, Escher, Bach..." (the best-selling book from D.R. Hofstadter) for a readable introduction to formal systems and the incompleteness problem.
12 of 13 people found the following review helpful
By lexo1941
Format:Paperback
There is a full-length biography of Kurt Godel by John Dawson, one of Godel's literary executors and a co-editor of his collected works. In the meantime, this short book tries to give the non-mathenmatician a basic grounding in the facts of his life, the nature of his achievement and the measure of his continuing influence. It's true that the non-technical explanations of Godel's work are remarkably ingenious and vivid, but in most cases they weren't necessarily invented by the book's authors. The style is often awkward, reading as though it was translated from the German by somebody for whom English isn't a first language, and there are a number of basic factual errors - for example, Ludwig Wittgenstein never wrote a book called "Logical Investigations". Being the biography fiend that I am, I could have done with a lot more about Godel's bizarre life and eccentric personality, but maybe it's best to appreciate the man's work before we start being curious about, for example, why he thought he was being poisoned.
To conclude: approach this little sucker with caution. It seems overpriced to me, and the mistakes I've noticed only make me worry about the ones that I haven't.
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful
By D. P. Briggs
Format:Paperback
I don't know how this compares with other books about Godel's life and work, but I've found this an enjoyable read. The main ideas are explained very clearly. The impact of Godel's work on the fields of computer science, cognitive science... is very interesting.
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
›
Go to Amazon.com to see all 16 reviews
3.7 out of 5 stars
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
- Books > Biography > Medical, Legal & Social Sciences > Philosophy
- Books > Biography > Science, Mathematics & Technology > Science
- Books > History > Other Historical Subjects > History of Science
- Books > Science & Nature > Mathematics > History of Mathematics
- Books > Science & Nature > Mathematics > Mathematical Foundations > Mathematical Logic
- Books > Science & Nature > Popular Science > Maths
- Books > Scientific, Technical & Medical
- Books > Society, Politics & Philosophy > Philosophy
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
