Good biography but terrible narration

I’ve always been a bit obsessed with mathematician and logician, Kurt Gödel. Mainly because he seemed to come at problems sideways, but admittedly also because he was a bit of a tragic hero: a man who battled mental illness (paranoid delusions and self-starvation) for most of his life until it caused his death, but who also inspired Albert Einstein to continue attending the Institute for Advanced Studies at Princeton so Einstein could continue to enjoy their daily walks and talks.

Gödel is famous for his Incompleteness Theorem(s), which states that in any reasonable mathematical system there will always be true statements which might be true but can never be proved. This implies that it might never be possible to achieve a complete understanding of the universe, or even a full understanding of the machines that we build (which seems prescient, as I write this in AI obsessed 2024). Practical findings to date support Gödel’s theories, but thankfully that hasn’t stopped the human race from trying to understand everything anyway.

There have been many books, book chapters, and articles written on the life of Kurt Gödel. The gold standard remains ‘Logical Dilemmas: the life and works of Kurt Godel’ by John W Dawson (1997), which is based on the authors first-hand review of Gödel’s notes and letters, and which covers his work in far more breadth and depth than this latest biography. By comparison, ‘Edge of reason’ is written deliberately to be more accessible than previous biographies, and is targeted at a general public with an interest in popular science. It focuses more on Gödel’s struggles with nazism in his home Vienna, and with his health, than do other biographies (though they all mention these topics). In fact, one criticism I have read of ‘Edge of Reason’ is that there is too much historical context. I for one appreciated the context (especially in light of recent geo-socio-political events, which feel rather familiar), but the point is taken. There IS a lot of history in here, but I liked it because said context not only marked (sometimes ended) the lives of the most talented collection of people to appear on our planet for many years, but also shaped and drove the subsequent work of those who survived. Without the context, you just wouldn’t understand Gödel (or Einstein, von Neumann, and many others) anywhere near as well. However, I also accept that because Gödel was so painfully shy and socially anxious (he couldn’t teach, for this reason) there just isn’t that much to say about his life outside of his work (other than the rather tragic nature of his death). By comparison, his larger than life contemporary- mathematician and physicist Johnny von Neumann - provided biographers with an endless collection of outrageous anecdotes with which to entertain readers. In fact, you couldn’t get two more different people than Gödel and von Neumann, but they both contributed hugely to modern maths and physics, despite their differences.

‘Edge of Reason’ is recommended, but if you are reasonably competent in (or interested in) science or maths you might like to give ‘Logical Dilemmas’ a look. There are also many good books on the work of Godel.

NB: I listened to the audiobook on Audible. The narration is poor. Far too fast and without any attempt to give emphases where needed. Eg the narrator reads the title of the next chapter as if he is simply reading the next sentence. There is also no change in tone when reading a quotation. I slowed it down to 80% and it helped, but I will be avoiding the narrator in future.

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