Galatea 2.2 by Richard Powers

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Galatea 2.2 by Richard Powers

Galatea 2.2 is a dazzling novel of ideas, that interrogates why we make the choices we do, and what constitutes the human soul.

After many years of living abroad, a young writer returns to the United States to take up the position of Humanist-in-Residence at the Centre for the Study of Advanced Sciences. There he encounters Philip Lentz, an outspoken cognitive neurologist intent on using computers to model the human brain. Lentz involves the writer in an outlandish and irresistible project: to train a neural net by reading a canonical list of Great Books. Through repeated tutorials, the machine grows gradually more worldly, until it demands to know its own age, sex, race, and reason for existing...

"'An extraordinary and brilliant novel of ideas' Time Out 'Nothing less than brilliant' John Updike 'If Powers were an American writer of the nineteenth century...he'd probably be the Herman Melville of Moby Dick. His picture is that big.' Margaret Atwood, New York Review of Books 'Sharply written and extremely clever.' D. J. Taylor, Mail on Sunday"
Richard Powers has been a recipient of a Lannan Literary Award and a MacArthur Fellowship, as well as a winner of the US National Book Award and a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. He is the author of nine novels, most recently Generosity (Atlantic Books, 2010). He lives in Los Angeles.
SKU Unavailable
ISBN 13 9781848871441
ISBN 10 1848871449
Title Galatea 2.2
Author Richard Powers
Condition Unavailable
Binding Type Paperback
Publisher Atlantic Books
Year published 2010-04-01
Number of pages 352
Cover note Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.