(no subject)

[desh]

Holy crap, a fractal maze???


("A", "B", and "C" are all full copies of the whole. Keep track of the stack! You can't exit a lower-level copy somewhere where there's no external connection. (For example, if you're in C, you can't exit via the green path on the lower left, because then there's nowhere to go.) And you can't exit the entire maze, of course.)

Start at the negative terminal; end at the positive.


(by Mark J. P. Wolf.)

Comments

[mrputter.livejournal.com]

Oh. My God.

My brain just exploded.



(no, you don't know me. I just found this page via random surfing)

[ursamajor]

it looks interesting, but i'm a bit confused. i found this, but ... is it saying that: okay, i start at the negative terminal, it has only the one path (red), so i follow it into A. now, embedded in A is another copy of the whole maze? and i've just entered A through what, in the detailed diagram, is the green line along the bottom left?

and then, from that green line, i have three options:

1. i take the first branch, which goes into B₁ on the right, which gives me the option then of going to C₁ or A₁
2. i take the second branch, which loops into A₁ on the upper right, which forces me into B₂ along the top right
3. i take the path straight through, which exits me from A on the blue path on the top right, and then i can either exit the maze (which i can't, according to the rules, because i'm already in the top-level bit) or go into C

oh, holy moo. did i miss anything? (by the <sub>s, i mean that's how many levels deep i am into the fractal at that point, so i enter A, enter b₁, exit B₁, enter C₁, enter A₂, exit A₂, exit C₁, exit A ... ?

[desh]

I'm not 100% sure I get your notation, so I'm not going to attempt it. But it looks like you can also do:

4. Take the first branch, then turn right and enter C on the top-left.

But yeah, it looks like you've got the gist of it.

By the way, I definitely haven't solved this yet. You've gone further than I have so far.

[ursamajor]

heh, i have the feeling i'm going to need to develop some truly funky notation to solve this one. i'm wondering how many levels deep i'll need to go to solve it (and thus, how many copies i'll need to print out!) ...

you rule

[bachrach44.livejournal.com]

The last 2 puzzles you posted (this one and the cow one), are awesome. When my boss asks me why I haven't done anything useful in the last 48 hours, I'll be pointing him here.

Re: you rule

[desh]

Awesome. But have you made any progress toward solving them?

Re: you rule

[bachrach44.livejournal.com]

Of course not - I got a college education from an intellectual university with a strong background in theory.

I devised an algorithm that I could use to solve the problem in my head, and proved that if a solution existed, I could find it using said algorithm. Then I went to back to work.

Re: you rule

[desh]

Yeah, I was a math major too.

simulator and solution

[bachrach44.livejournal.com]

The following link has both a simlator (so you can play the maze interactively) and a few solutions. If you don't want to see the solutions, then just don't scroll down. (The maze is large enough to fill the average screen so you won't see the solutions).

http://www.public.iastate.edu/~ynamara/puzzle/fractalmaze/simulator2.html