Finish reading Godel, Escher, Bach

I am only 75 pages (not including preface) into the 20th anniversary edition and some interesting things have begun to happen. In the past, I have always liked classical music but I never really preferred it over anything else. Having been introduced to canons, fugues and other musical concepts, both descriptively in the chapters and allegorically in the dialogs, I now hear them and appreciate them in ways I never have before. Listening to classical music, particularly the music of J. S. Bach, has become a more mentally engaging activity. Because I prefer to be engaged, classical music is swiftly rising in my preferences.

Being the geek I am, the first thing I did when confronted with the MU-puzzle in chapeter I was convert the MIU system into Ruby. I probably didn’t need to do this to develop my answer to the MU-puzzle but it was a fun thought experiment and doing this did reveal my improper understanding of Rule IV. When I realized MUU becomes M and not MU, it was quite the epiphany.

As an aside, even though the rules of MIU seem tailor made for regular expressions, and despite my love of and proclivity for regular expressions, the simplest thing as I developed MIU test first ended up being a solution without a single regular expression in it anywhere. I never would have guessed.

It arrived Tuesday. Wednesday night, I read the new preface to the 20th anniversary edition, not much for me but an honest start. Thursday and Friday I read 20 pages of the first chapter. Already, I am trying to learn more about classical music, especially Bach and I am craving Escher’s art. I also want to see if I can carve the GEB blocks on the cover. They appeal to me and I might start making them for people. Perhaps someone’s initials would spark a little thinking.