HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: ida@atomic (David Goldschmidt)
Subject: Re: Billion-year survivability
Keywords: pi, Louie
Organization: Princeton University, Dept. of Computer Science
Date: 21 Nov 92 01:35:40 GMT

Self replicating machines are an interesting idea, but you have to remember
that they need some material to make new machines out of.  Also, it seems 
likely that humans themselves might decide the machines are a nuisance, and
build something to wipe them out (presumably another self-replicating machine)

What's wrong with putting a probe in a galactic orbit such that it will arrive
back here in a billion years?  You could use a light sail to get it into the 
orbit (after all there's no hurry).  To avoid hitting dust, stars, etc, you
would probably tilt the orbit out of the plane of the galaxy.

Or, you could simply broadcast your message with a header asking for it to be 
returned in a billion years.  This probably has as much chance as anything.
(You can assume any race that can survive that long can decrypt the message
easily enough.  Who knows, maybe they get messages like this all the time.)

	David Patterson, guest on this account.

Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
From: jacobw@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Jacob Solomon Weinstein)
Subject: Re: Palindromes
Originator: news@nimaster
Organization: Princeton University
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1992 04:27:07 GMT

kenrolph@peg.pegasus.oz.au writes:
>I am looking to create a palindrome to set at the heart of a story I am 
>writing. It has occurred to me that there must be some information on the 
>subject around somewhere. There must be principles in English for creating 
>such sets of characters, such as frequently useable sets of letters or 
>words.
>
>Does anyone know of any books on this subject?

Along those lines, does anybody know of a program that helps one create
palindromes? Obviously, this would be harder to computerize than
anagram creation... And, if nobody knows of such a program out there,
does anybody have any suggestions on writing one? I've been toying with
the notion of creating a palindrome Hypercard stack.
Xref: sparky rec.puzzles:7395 rec.org.mensa:8419
From: clong@romulus.rutgers.edu (Chris Long)
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles,rec.org.mensa
Subject: The Crypto-Analogies Test
Date: 20 Nov 92 07:15:43 GMT
Followup-To: rec.puzzles
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.


I have nothing to do with this except that I had fun solving the
questions.  Daryl Inman has also put together "The Quest Test"
("The World's Hardest Analogies Test") which will be appearing
in the December issue of _Omni_.  It's longer and also significantly
more difficult than the CAT or the verbal portion of the Mega Test;
I scored 26/26 on the CAT and 22/24 on the Mega Test analogies but
I'm having a hard time getting above 65% on the Quest Test.

---Cut here---

                 The Crypto-Analogies Test

                       Daryl Inman
                       P.O. Box 92
                       Mexia, TX 76667

Here is a test which can be solved one of two ways: either one can
solve the analogies out right or solve the scrambled answers and then
fit them to the appropriate analogies.  I call it the Crypto-Analogies
Test.  I will score each person's responses for $5.00 and provide the
answers.  Please send a SASE.

Write the word that best completes each analogy.  For example, in the
analogy AMERICAN: (is to) ASTRONAUT:: (as) RUSSIAN: (is to) ?, the
best answer would be COSMONAUT.

 1. STEEL BALL: BRINELL:: FINGERNAIL, COPPER PENNY, PENKNIFE,
    STEELFILE: ?
 2. SLING: DAVID:: JAWBONE: ?
 3. DARK: DIM:: NOCTURNAL: ?
 4. 51: 50:: ULTIMATE: ?
 5. SEX: LOVE:: APHRODISIAC: ?
 6. CENTRIPETAL: CENTRIFUGAL:: MAGNETISM: ?
 7. FEAR OF VEHICLES: OCHOPHOBE:: LOVE OF TRAVEL: ?
 8. 10^30: NONILLION:: 100^100:: ?
 9. ENERGY CONTENT: ENTHALPY:: DEGREE OF DISORDER: ?
10. VEGETARIAN: HERBIVOROUS:: DIETER: ?
11. CHURCH THINGS: ECCLESIOLOGY:: LAST THINGS: ?
12. PRENATAL: POSTNATAL:: EUGENICS: ?
13. MACHINE: ANDROID:: MAN AND MACHINE: ?
14. AZTEC: INCA:: CORTEZ: ?
15. HOLMES: DOYLE:: DUPIN: ?
16. 5,880,000,000: LIGHT-YEAR:: 19,200,000,000,000: ?
17. VERTICAL: HORIZONTAL:: DYSPNEA: ?
18. MOZART: BACH:: CLASSICAL: ?
19. HANDS: ARMS:: SIGN LANGUAGE: ?
20. STRETCH: RACK:: DROP: ?
21. GALLON: BUSHEL:: BATH: ?
22. COMMUNICATE WITH THE DEAD: NECROMANCY:: DISCOVERING WATER: ?
23. PICTURE: HIEROGLYPHIC:: WEDGE: ?
24. MOSES AND ROCK: WATER:: JESUS AND WATER: ?
25. HELIUM: LEAD:: AERONAUT: ?
26. HEART: SYSTOLE:: ALIMENTARY CANAL: ?

"SCRAMBLED ANSWERS" FOR DARYL INMAN'S CRYPTO-ANALOGIES PUZZLE

APEHH               OGLOGO             EARPCS
TALTEPUNEMI         LOHIEPOHD          OASEERMHP
HACSOYGOETL         HMSO               IEWN
UNQTUAAA            SSONMA             LIEHRPT
BAHMNAYCODR         BGOCRY             RORAPZI
ETIISRPLSAS         MGAAEIMTSDNI       ROAOEHPTN
PAPRTDOSA           ALCERUUSPRC        QEBAORU
NEETCIHSU           EPO                OFCNUIREM
PUSGILOOHGAO        POTNYER
-- 
Chris Long, 265 Old York Rd., Bridgewater, NJ  08807-2618
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
From: mmdh@cbnewsf.cb.att.com (Mazen Mokhtar)
Subject: Re: Special sentence
Organization: AT&T
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 1992 17:12:35 GMT

In article <1992Nov16.233117.20615@hellgate.utah.edu> tolman%asylum.cs.utah.edu@cs.utah.edu (Kenneth Tolman) writes:
>What is special about these sentences?
>
>  Simon now is!
>  Axis six v.
>  3 moss is some.
>
>What are others?
>
"NeW MaN" is a cloths brand name that exhibits the same special property



Mazen Mokhtar
From: shamrake@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Danil Suits)
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
Subject: Re: the question is the answer ?!(SPOLIER?)
Date: 16 Nov 92 09:27:23 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin TX

If we are allowed to count a 'letter' for punctuation.

A: Three!

Danil

-- 
-- The Shamrake --    Zansellquasure  Flamarion
@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu          Bridge Club
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
From: karr@cs.cornell.edu (David Karr)
Subject: Re: Billion-year survivability
Keywords: pi, Louie
Organization: Cornell Univ. CS Dept, Ithaca NY 14853
Date: Fri, 20 Nov 1992 05:00:58 GMT

In article <1992Nov18.183510.15059@wam.umd.edu> difelici@wam.umd.edu (John Patrick DiFelici) writes:
>
>If you wanted to hand deliver the message, you could fly off into space in
>a rocket ship traveling near the speed of light.  Time it just right so that
>when you get back to Earth, the Earth's time frame has advanced 1 billion
>years.  You could then, hand deliver the message, as well as become the
>oldest living human in existance, at least going by your birth date.

If you set out in a rocket ship that maintains a constant acceleration
of one gravity (as perceived by you in the ship) for the entire duration
of a trip straight out to a point some distance away from the Earth and
back (obviously using its rockets to decelerate during part of that time),
and timed to take exactly 1 billion years Earth-frame time for the round
trip, how much will you age during the trip, assuming you live that long?
What is the dependence on the rate of acceleration?

-- David Karr (karr@cs.cornell.edu)


Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
From: nasadk@vccsouth09.its.rpi.edu (Kristopher Martin Nasadowski)
Subject: Re: Elements ending in H
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 1992 04:49:50 GMT

isaak@aurora.com (Mark Isaak) writes:

>There are lots of elements which end with 'h':  hydrogen, helium,
>holmium, hafnium, hahnium.

>You never said which end.

Admittedly, I had to look at a list of element to figure this one out, (and I'm
a chemistry major to boot!) but Bismuth is the only one that ends (as opposed to
begins) with an 'h'. The symbol Rh does exist, and this might provide what the
original poster had in mind.... (Rh = Rhodium)

Nazman
<nasadk@rpi.edu>
From: dsbb@ns1.cc.lehigh.edu (D. SPENCER BEECHER)
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
Subject: Re: Holes
Date: 20 Nov 92 02:20:45 GMT
Organization: Lehigh University

s2900@ii.uib.no writes:
>
>   Tore Nordstrand c/o s290@ii.uib.no
>

It's amazing how little Tore had to say after including so many keywords.
-- 
                   _ _     _ _     _ _
  -Spence         [O.O]   )x.x(   )O.O(
                    O       O      -*-
From: leue@crd.ge.com (Bill Leue)
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
Subject: Re: message for the future
Date: 19 Nov 92 15:29:47 GMT
Reply-To: leue@crd.ge.com
Organization: General Electric Research & Development

In article 10159@ncrwat.Waterloo.NCR.COM, tjgerman@53iss6.Waterloo.NCR.COM (Trevor German) writes:
>
>	Re: sending a message to the future.
>
>	Obviously anything placed on earth is likely to be destroyed
>	by plate techtonics etc so no good burying something. A transmition
>	that takes that long to get back would be hard to receive even if
>	you were expecting it.
>
>		I have a much better idea. Take a dead satelite. A big one,
>	like say the moon. Then blast its surface with  enough nukes to
>	make an easily recognisable pattern that would be only partly
>	erased by comet and meteoride collisions. Then just for good measure,
>	adjust the rotational velocity of the moon so that the message
>	always faces the earth. The message could be something like
>	a big face......................
>
>
>	Came to me in a dream.

   Well, if you say so.  On the other hand, it's exactly the central gimmick
in Jack Vance's SF novel "The Face", published in paperback by DAW as number
four of the five "Demon Princes" novels.  In the novel, the motivation for creating 
the giant face on the moon of a certain planet was revenge, not information
retrieval.

-Bill Leue
leue@crd.ge.com
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
From: tolman%asylum.cs.utah.edu@cs.utah.edu (Kenneth Tolman)
Subject: Special sentence
Date: 16 Nov 92 23:31:17 MST
Organization: University of Utah, CompSci Dept

What is special about these sentences?

  Simon now is!
  Axis six v.
  3 moss is some.

What are others?
From: piz@cbnewsl.cb.att.com (G G ZIPFEL)
Subject: Re: Songs containing states 
Organization: AT&T
Distribution: na
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 1992 18:59:54 GMT
Keywords: (A few obscure ones...)

paul@media-lab.media.mit.edu (Paul Dworkin) writes:
>A listing game:
>
>I'm interested songs which mention states in the US.
>I'd like to have a list of at least one for each.
>
>Could people send me ideas for various states?
>I've included a list below and some example.
>
> Massachusetts
                "University of Massachusetts it's educational!"-The Pixies
> Minnesota
		"I'm feeling California, Looking Minnesota"-Soundgarden
> Mississippi  
      "Mississipi Queen..."-Mountain
> Oregon

   "Well I crossed my old man back in Oregon, don't take me alive"-Steely Dan

> Rhode Island
   "Playin' for a week in Rhode Island, MAn came to the stage one night"-Boston
> Texas
   "I've been to Rome, Dallas Texas, Man I thought I'd seen it all" - Van Halen

>	    -Paul Dworkin	paul@media-lab.media.mit.edu  (617) 253-0664



	Another boring but nearly complete answer is college fight songs
	for state schools...

-- 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Zip   Steelers in 92!          | Illinois Basketball: More three point 
      Bubby's Back!!!!         | shooters than you can shake a stick at!
"I didn't lose, the Team lost" - Coach
From: ramana@wsl.dec.com (Ramanendra Ravi)
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
Subject: Re: A Simple Puzzle
Date: 23 Nov 92 19:21:38 GMT
Reply-To: ramana@wsl.dec.com (Ramanendra Ravi)
Distribution: su
Organization: DEC Western Software Lab


How about 54 !!!!

Raman.
--

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
260 N. Mathilda Ave.                            (408)738-1360 (Res.)
#L-8                                            (415)688-6808 (Off.)
From: ggww@sjfc.UUCP (Gerry Wildenberg)
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
Subject: Re: Word sequence
Date: 16 Nov 92 17:52:34 GMT
Reply-To: ggww@sjfc.UUCP (Gerry Wildenberg)
Organization: Saint John Fisher College, Rochester, NY

In article <BxGGMp.9Iv@brunel.ac.uk> Barry.John.Good@brunel.ac.uk (Barry John Good) writes:
>I hope this isn't an FAQ, but what's the longest sequence of 4-letter words 
>that you can find such that the last three letters of each word are the
>first three letters of the next in the sequence?
>
>e.g., ECHO CHOP HOPE OPEN PEND ENDS

First a bit of pedantry. You undoubtedly meant "the longest sequence
of _distinct_ 4-letter words ... ", else:

    ease asea seas ease ... forms an infinite list.

That said, I liked your puzzle and quickly came up with:

case asea seas ease asem semi emit mite item temp

I will be surprised if no one writes a program to come up with some
huge sequence.

-- 
Gerry Wildenberg                         
St. John Fisher College                  
Rochester, NY 14618                      ggww@sjfc.edu
From: dsbb@ns1.cc.lehigh.edu (D. SPENCER BEECHER)
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
Subject: Re: the question is the answer ?!
Date: 16 Nov 92 23:59:33 GMT
Organization: Lehigh University

>>> Q: How many letters are in the answer?

After giving it a great deal of thought and consulting with nobody
in particular, but resorting to a great deal of wanton typing with
little or no point, I have decided that the definative answer, for
all practical purposes is no finite number, but sensitive to the
circumstance, and in this specific situation totals exactly three
hundred letters, no more, and no less.
-- 
                   _ _     _ _     _ _
  -Spence         [O.O]   )x.x(   )O.O(
                    O       O      -*-
From: umahf69@ma.ic.ac.uk (Nairo Aparicio)
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
Subject: Gale and bridges
Date: 19 Nov 92 21:49:15 GMT
Organization: Imperial College Mathematics Department

Hello friends

Here there is a problem published in one of the boards of this department:

"In a certain wide river, there are 6 islands joined to each other and the banks
by 13 bridges, as shown below.   Unfortunately if there is a gale, the bridges
will each collapse with independent probability 1/2.   What is the probability
that the river will be crossable after the gale?"

___________________________________________________________
                              |            |           |    
                              |            |           |
                             O-----O----O island
                              |            |           |             	river
                             O-----O----O
                              |            |            |
                              |            |            |  bridge
_______________|______|______|________________________________


I do not know if it has been posted before, I am new here.   Anyway,  the answer
can be proved straight forward without any hard calculation.   

If you think this is to easy for you,  try to solve it assuming that each bridge
will collapse with independent probability   "p"  where  0<=p<=1.

I have the answer for both problems, I will post them sometime in the future.

					Nairo Aparicio
Xref: sparky rec.puzzles:7415 rec.org.mensa:8437
From: clong@remus.rutgers.edu (Chris Long)
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles,rec.org.mensa
Subject: Re: The Crypto-Analogies Test
Date: 20 Nov 92 23:46:35 GMT
Followup-To: rec.puzzles
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.

Make these changes:

>  8. 10^30: NONILLION:: 100^100:: ?

 8. 10^30: NONILLION:: 10^100:: ?

> 16. 5,880,000,000: LIGHT-YEAR:: 19,200,000,000,000: ?

16. 5,880,000,000,000: LIGHT-YEAR:: 19,200,000,000,000: ?

Both of these errors were in my copy of the CAT, so as Krusty would
say, "Don't blame me, I didn't do it".
-- 
Chris Long, 265 Old York Rd., Bridgewater, NJ  08807-2618
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
From: amorgan@Xenon.Stanford.EDU (Crunchy Frog)
Subject: Re: Mastermind - some EASY questions.
Organization: Computer Science Department, Stanford University.
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1992 19:18:21 GMT

In article <BxzoJH.7Gn@cantua.canterbury.ac.nz> 
  wft@math.canterbury.ac.nz (Bill Taylor) writes:
>1. What is the best thing to do when following a very slow car ?
Ram them
>2. What is the term for a single run through a compiler ?
Which stage?
>3. What is a common slang term for an implicit sexual suggestion ?
Wannafuck?
>4. What is the most usual method of obtaining the ball in basketball ?
Kneeing the guy in the groin.
>5. What is the most commonly heard call in contract bridge ?
Muriel, why the fuck didn't you support my clubs?

C Frog
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
From: umahf69@ma.ic.ac.uk (Nairo Aparicio)
Subject: Re: Sequence
Organization: Imperial College Mathematics Department
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 92 21:19:22 GMT

In article <19921116.170715143595.NETNEWS@BLEKUL11>, Andre' Pirard
<pirard@vm1.ulg.ac.be> writes:
|> 1
|> 11
|> 21
|> 1211
|> 111221
|> ?

The answer is 

312211

three 1, two 2 and one 1 in the last line

			Nairo Aparicio
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
From: speters@dvlseq.us.oracle.com (Stephen Peters)
Subject: Re: Our favorite series
Organization: Oracle World HQ, Redwood Shores, California
Date: Wed, 18 Nov 1992 20:09:29 GMT
X-Disclaimer: This message was written by an unauthenticated user
              at Oracle Corporation.  The opinions expressed are those
              of the user and not necessarily those of Oracle.

In article <98019@netnews.upenn.edu> varhus@meringue.seas.upenn.edu (Kristofor A Varhus) writes:

>Here's everybody's favorite series again:
>
>	1
>	11
>	21
>	1211
>	111221
>	...
>
>1. Which is the first term that has a "4" in it?
>
>2. Prove your answer to number 1.

SPOILERS HO!

I was just thinking about this problem a little while ago, and I'm
convinced that there are *no* terms containing a "4".  Here is my
reasoning:

Each term has an even number of digits, and can be broken up into two
digit segments (this is purely for readability's sake):

...
12 21
11 12 21
31 22 11
...

In order for a "4" to appear, we must get a set of four consecutive
digits of the same numbers in the previous term.  This could occur in
one of the following two ways:

... xx xx ...
... yx xx xz ...

The first cannot occur, because the two terms would appear instead as
... (2*x)x ....  The second cannot appear because it would appear
instead as ... (x+y)x xz ...

For example, we can't get ... 11 11 ..., because the process to create
that term would instead give us 21.  In addition, we can't get
something like ... 21 11 13 ..., because the process that created that
term would yield 31 13 instead.

Hope this makes some amount of sense...

Stephen Peters
Oracle Sun SBU
From: hoey@zogwarg.etl.army.mil (Dan Hoey)
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
Subject: Re: Our favorite series
Summary: YAYAYAYAFAQ
Keywords: Memphis Blues again
Date: 18 Nov 92 00:19:51 GMT
Followup-To: alt.ya.ya.ya.ya
Organization: Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, DC

varhus@meringue.seas.upenn.edu (Kristofor A Varhus) belabors:
>Here's everybody's favorite series again:
>	1,11,21,1211,111221,...
>1. Which is the first term that has a "4" in it?
That's in the FAQ, too.
>2. Prove your answer to number 1.
It's too easy to bother.  RTFFAQ.
Come back when you have something new.

Dan Hoey
Hoey@AIC.NRL.Navy.Mil
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
From: cab@col.hp.com (Chris Best)
Subject: Re: message for the future
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1992 14:46:12 GMT
Organization: your service

cab@col.hp.com (Chris Best) writes:
> >same side to the Earth.... That's why its called the "Dark Side Of
> >the Moon".
> >the Moon"...
> 
> ----------
> 
> Nope.  The side that faces AWAY from Earth has that nickname.

---------

Damn modem.
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
From: karr@cs.cornell.edu (David Karr)
Subject: Re: message for the future
Organization: Cornell Univ. CS Dept, Ithaca NY 14853
Date: Sat, 21 Nov 1992 00:06:53 GMT

In article <1992Nov20.163058@IASTATE.EDU> macster@IASTATE.EDU (Michael C Mccarty) writes:
>In article <10159@ncrwat.Waterloo.NCR.COM>, tjgerman@53iss6.Waterloo.NCR.COM
>(Trevor German) writes:
>> 	... Then just for good measure,
>> 	adjust the rotational velocity of the moon so that the message
>> 	always faces the earth. The message could be something like
>> 	a big face......................
>
>Ummm.....  I kinda always thought that the moon always DID show the
>same side to the Earth.... That's why its called the "Dark Side Of
>the Moon".

It's a joke ... I'm sure the bit about the "big face" was intended to
tip you off.

And incidentally, the far side of the Moon gets plenty of sunlight, even
if we aren't (usually) there to see it.  The Moon's rotation matches its
revolution about the Earth, not about the Sun.

-- David Karr (karr@cs.cornell.edu)
Date: Saturday, 21 Nov 1992 14:34:28 EST
From: <RVESTERM@vma.cc.nd.edu>
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
Subject: Re: Billion-year survivability
 <1992Nov21.181616.23596@newshub.ccs.yorku.ca>

i really should take up using those inane "smilie" things.  trouble
is, i hate the buggers.

anyway, tony, would this help:

     why don't you put your message in an envelope and mark
     it, "do not open until nov. 21, 1000001992"? :) :) :) :)
     :) :) :) ;) :-) 8) :} :) :) :)

bleagh, i feel icky.  i hate those things.

bob vesterman.
From: grabiner@math.harvard.edu (David Grabiner)
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
Subject: Re: Mini-FAQ
Date: 22 Nov 92 03:18:10 GMT
Organization: /etc/organization
In-reply-to: sjsmith@cs.umd.edu's message of 22 Nov 92 01:09:15 GMT

In article <62246@mimsy.umd.edu>, Stephen Joseph Smith writes:

> The rec.puzzles FAQ is incredible.  It covers an enormous range of puzzles.

> The only problem is... it's *too* big.  Few first-time posters to the
> newsgroup are going to read it all.

> I propose that somebody creates a mini-FAQ containing the *really*
> frequently asked questions...  Proposed entries:

> "What is the next term in this sequence?  1, 11, 21, 1211, 111221,
> 312211..."

> Monty Haul

> 26 = L. of the A.

> Does anybody know where any more of these [situation puzzles] can be found?"

I also think this is a good idea.  If the VFAQ list is posted to
rec.puzzles and news.answers frequently, new posters will be likely to
see it, and thus less likely to repost the Very Frequently Asked
Questions.


--
David Grabiner, grabiner@zariski.harvard.edu
"We are sorry, but the number you have dialed is imaginary."
"Please rotate your phone 90 degrees and try again."
Disclaimer: I speak for no one and no one speaks for me.
Newsgroups: rec.puzzles
From: s290@brems.ii.uib.no ( Per Ivar Roervik)
Subject:  Holes
Keywords: 
  Everybody knows the answer to the "cylindrcal hole in a sphere"
  problem.
    Now, what is the size of the largest hole drilled by a 1 diameter
  circular drill in a 2x2x2 cube. 
  Also what are the largest area circular & largest area holes.  
Organization: DevNull A/S
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 92 12:47:51 GMT


   Tore Nordstrand c/o s290@ii.uib.no