@dougmerritt yeah, I think I butchered it, but I recall that it was a mathematical book by a common lisp programmer, and its blurb included something like what I said about the halting problem being a hint of something more general. (And I don't think it was by Hofstadter per the other toot). I remembered it as being in one of the book lists on cliki, but when I looked, I couldn't find it or a reference to anything that sounded like it.