Posted 24 July 2010 - 09:12 PM
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Posted 14 August 2010 - 02:50 AM
The cube is a great puzzle. I can't even fathom solving it without any reference or help. With the aid of a book, I was able to memorize the beginner's method and solve the cube more or less reliably, though not particularly quickly. I've since forgotten some of it, and at the moment can only solve the first two layers, though I could relearn it if I had to. My ten year old son can solve a 3x3 in a bit less than one minute. He uses a more sophisticated algorithm than I did. The world's record for solving a 3x3 is 7.08 seconds.Finally got round to one, after 36 years. Damn that's a tough one, if you try to find the algorithms by yourself.
Erno Rubik did it in a month, but someone claimed to solve it in 4 hours. Has anyone tried their hands on it? Just trying to get some frame of reference, to bolster my ego a bit
Posted 14 August 2010 - 11:13 AM
Posted 14 August 2010 - 11:16 AM
Like niner, I learned an algorithm from a book when the cube was invented. After two weeks I could solve the cube in under 30 seconds, depending on how it was randomized. I showed the cube to one of my brothers (a physicist) who'd never seen it. He solved played with it for half an hour, and announced he had a general solution and we compared our methods. He said his was an inferior method, as it had only one manipulation applied iteratively, whereas the book method I used had four, and allowed for a more rapid solution.
According to Martin Gardner, in one of his Scientific American columns, John Horton Conway (the mathematician and physicist of Cambridge and later Princeton) learned of the cube from a description by another mathematician; they did not have an actual cube. Conway closed his eyes, and after 13 seconds opened them, and said "I've solved it." He'd visualized the cube and mentally solved it, and confirmed his solution with witnesses when they got hold of an actual cube. The column may be online somewhere, it lists a solution and facts about the cube.
Posted 14 August 2010 - 11:33 AM
Like niner, I learned an algorithm from a book when the cube was invented. After two weeks I could solve the cube in under 30 seconds, depending on how it was randomized. I showed the cube to one of my brothers (a physicist) who'd never seen it. He solved played with it for half an hour, and announced he had a general solution and we compared our methods. He said his was an inferior method, as it had only one manipulation applied iteratively, whereas the book method I used had four, and allowed for a more rapid solution.
According to Martin Gardner, in one of his Scientific American columns, John Horton Conway (the mathematician and physicist of Cambridge and later Princeton) learned of the cube from a description by another mathematician; they did not have an actual cube. Conway closed his eyes, and after 13 seconds opened them, and said "I've solved it." He'd visualized the cube and mentally solved it, and confirmed his solution with witnesses when they got hold of an actual cube. The column may be online somewhere, it lists a solution and facts about the cube.
Give me a nootropic that can make me do that. I will pay all my life's savings for it.
Posted 14 August 2010 - 04:45 PM
hahahahahaha...................... sheeeet. i must say, amidst my depressive bout in the last few days, ur comment got quite a laugh out of me. thanks
Posted 14 August 2010 - 04:53 PM
Finally got round to one, after 36 years. Damn that's a tough one, if you try to find the algorithms by yourself.
Erno Rubik did it in a month, but someone claimed to solve it in 4 hours. Has anyone tried their hands on it? Just trying to get some frame of reference, to bolster my ego a bit
Posted 14 August 2010 - 05:16 PM
Like niner, I learned an algorithm from a book when the cube was invented. After two weeks I could solve the cube in under 30 seconds, depending on how it was randomized. I showed the cube to one of my brothers (a physicist) who'd never seen it. He solved played with it for half an hour, and announced he had a general solution and we compared our methods. He said his was an inferior method, as it had only one manipulation applied iteratively, whereas the book method I used had four, and allowed for a more rapid solution.
According to Martin Gardner, in one of his Scientific American columns, John Horton Conway (the mathematician and physicist of Cambridge and later Princeton) learned of the cube from a description by another mathematician; they did not have an actual cube. Conway closed his eyes, and after 13 seconds opened them, and said "I've solved it." He'd visualized the cube and mentally solved it, and confirmed his solution with witnesses when they got hold of an actual cube. The column may be online somewhere, it lists a solution and facts about the cube.
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