Research Catalog

Logical dilemmas : the life and work of Kurt Gödel

Title: Logical dilemmas : the life and work of Kurt Gödel / John W. Dawson, Jr.
Author: Dawson, John W. (John William), 1944-
Publication: Wellesley, Mass. : A K Peters, [1997], ©1997.

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Status	Format	Access	Call Number	Item Location
Request for On-site Use Request Scan How do I pick up this item and when will it be ready?	Text	Request in advance	QA29.G58 D39 1997	Off-site

Description

xiv, 361 pages : illustrations; 24 cm

Summary

This definitive biography of the logician and philosopher Kurt Godel is the first in-depth account to integrate details of his personal life with his work and is based on the author's intensive study of Godel's papers and surviving correspondence. Godel (1906-1978) is considered to be the preeminent logic researcher of the twentieth century.
His noted works on the completeness of first-order logic, the incompleteness of formal number theory, and the relative consistency of the Axiom of Choice and the Continuum Hypothesis established bounds on the efficacy of formal methods in investigating foundational questions. He is also noted for his unique and distinctive writings on the philosophy behind mathematics, and his lesser-known results in cosmology raised problematic issues in the philosophy of time. Dawson, a logician and historian of science, examines the life of this driven man whose work on the foundation of mathematics has fundamentally changed our thoughts on these subjects and has stimulated much of the research conducted in this century.
He further explores the relationship between Godel's personality and his scientific achievements and describes the impact Godel's results have had on our modern world view.

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Bibliography (note)

ISBN

1568810253

LCCN

96050001

OCLC

ocm36104240

Owning Institutions

Columbia University Libraries