Anathem

[lyalikov]

"Anathem" (2008) by Neal Stephenson
    A 900 pages sci-fi about a sanctuary for extraterrestrial philosophers, protected from the corrupting influences of the outside saecular world and their extraterrestrial guests - aliens, they are fighting. Apparently aliens come from Earth and some other planets, cosmoses or something.
    Internally it’s about Plato-Leibniz-Husserl-Gödel platonism struggling with Kant. Main Gödel ideas as Stephenson states them:

1. Entities that are the subject matter of mathematics exist independently of human perceptions, definitions and constructions.
   
2. The human mind is capable of perceiving such entities.

    The fun is, on his way to new solid Leibniz-like metaphysics system, Gödel got some Einstein equations solutions, which say it is possible to travel backwards in time, supposing the universe is rotating. Meanwhile platonism is more about religiosity, than practical scientific or social instrument.
    Apart from pure platonism the question of syntax and semantics is a recurring story theme. I might have misunderstood Neal, but it seems, he contrasts them: render unto computer the things that are syntactic, unto human - the semantic ones. Karl Popper in his “Objective Knowledge” (1972) chapter 9.III recalls Alfred Tarski’s results of expressing Ln language semantics as another Ln+1 language syntax. Someday I should dig this a bit deeper, but as for now Popper seem to be closer to truth (pun intended: chapter 9 is all about the truth theory): semantics, consciousness etc are more about quantity, than quality.
    Goofs: in russian edition on page 738 it’s said: “... was going so fast through the atmosphere, that it was tearing electrons away from atoms”. Hm. Photoelectric effect is an everyday thing since some 1830-ies. Passage came out a bit awkward instead of breathtaking.
    All in all if you like plump Plato-Leibniz sci-fi, this one is nice to try.