Godel, Escher, Bach : an eternal golden braid

Includes index.

Includes bibliography (p. 746-756) and references.

Introduction: A Musico-Logical Offering
Chapter I: The MU-Puzzle
Chapter II: Meaning and Form in Mathematics
Chapter III: Figure and Ground
Chapter IV: Consistency, Completeness, and Geometry
Chapter V: Recursive Structures and Processes
Chapter VI: The Location of Meaning
Chapter VII: The Propositional Calculus
Chapter VIII: Typographical Number Theory
Chapter IX: Mumon and Gödel
Chapter X: Levels of Description, and Computer Systems
Chapter XI: Brains and Thoughts
Chapter XII: Minds and Thoughts
Chapter XIII: BlooP and FlooP and GlooP
Chapter XIV: On Formally Undecidable Propositions of TNT and Related Systems
Chapter XV: Jumping out of the System
Chapter XVI: Self-Ref and Self-Rep
Chapter XVII: Church, Turing, Tarski, and Others
Chapter XVIII: Artificial Intelligence: Retrospects
Chapter XIX: Artificial Intelligence: Prospects
Chapter XX: Strange Loops, or Tangled Hierarchies

The book alternates between explanatory chapters and imaginative dialogues inspired by Lewis Carroll. It demonstrates how mathematical logic, visual art, and music share deep structural similarities. Hofstadter argues that consciousness may arise from complex patterns of self-reference, offering insights into human cognition and artificial intelligence. It remains one of the most influential books in cognitive science and won the 1980 Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction.