Date: 25 July 1980 10:53 edt From: Greenberg.Multics at MIT-Multics Subject: Re: "blindfold" cube? To: RP at MIT-MC (Richard Pavelle) cc: ZIM at MIT-MC, CUBE-LOVERS at MIT-MC In-Reply-To: Message of 25 July 1980 09:06 edt from Richard Pavelle This interchange very elegantly points out the difference between the Mathematician's view of the Cube and the Hacker(System Programmer-type)'s view. While an algorithm that looked at the initial state and categorized it ("Perform the folliwng 152 steps for configuration 106xy205a (left-handed) and it will be solved") would thrill mathematicians, practical cube-solving ALGORITHMS require iteration, conditionals, subroutines, and other program-like techniques. Ineed, many non-cognoscenti have watched me solve the cube, noting that I look at it only a very small percent of the time (seeing which subroutine to invoke, as you will, ) but they don't know that, and conclude that I "solve cubes basically without looking". The whole notion of algorithmic cubism is based upon "I will do this hairy thing and it will have this desired effect, and I need not thinK about the intermediate states, unless, god forbid, the phone rings, etc." To contain a cube map and intermediate states of transforms in one's head woud, in my mind, involve a greater skill than blindfold chess; it is not a normal human-memory capability, although doubtless institutiOnalized freaks with pathological intelligence/visulization problems (in the positive direction) exist who could conceivable do such a thing.