Contents

Preface

Lucky Number

1. Computation Everywhere

1.1: The Lifebox Triad

1.2: A New Kind of Science

1.3: Reckoning a Sum

1.4: Analytical Engines

1.5: The Tiniest Brains

1.6: Inside the Beige Box

1.7: Plugged In

1.8: Flickercladding

The Million Chakras

2. Our Rich World

2.1: Rough and Smooth

2.2: Everywhere at Once

2.3: Chaos in a Bouncing Ball

2.4: The Meaning of Gnarl

2.5: What Is Reality?

2.6: How Robots Get High

Ain’t Paint

3. Life’s Lovely Gnarl

3.1: Wetware

3.2: The Morphogenesis of a Brindle Cow

3.3: Surfing Your Moods

3.4: Gnarly Neighbors

3.5: Live Robots

3.6: How We Got So Smart

Terry’s Talker

4. Enjoying Your Mind

4.1: Sensational Emotions

4.2: The Network Within

4.3: Thoughts as Gliders and Scrolls

4.4: “I Am”

4.5: The Lifebox

4.6: The Mind Recipe

4.7: What Do You Want?

4.8: Quantum Soul

The Kind Rain

5. The Human Hive

5.1: Hive Minds

5.2: Language and Telepathy

5.3: Commercial and Gnarly Aesthetics

5.4: Power and Money

5.5: The Past and Future History of Gnarl

Hello Infinity

6. Reality Upgrade

6.1: Eight Ontologies

6.2: The Computational Zoo

6.3: Faster and Smarter

6.4: Random Truth

6.5: The Answers

Appendix. On Natural Undecidability

A1: Rudiments of Recursion Theory

A.2: Turing’s Theorem and Natural Undecidability

Glossary

Notes

Image Credits