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4D Analogue of Megaminx Puzzle

Posted by timothy on from the pretty-puzzling dept.

roice writes "The crazy hypercubists who created the 4D and 5D Rubik's cubes (here are previous Slashdot posts on the 4-D one and the 5-D one) have now developed a free working 4-dimensional software analogue of the Megaminx puzzle. Composed of 120 dodecahedral cells, the underlying structure is arguably the most beautiful of 4D geometrical shapes, with amazing symmetries and no analogue in dimensions higher than 4. Though some have already begun working on solutions for this 'Hyperminx,' it has yet to be solved by anyone. Also, when it comes to number of positions, it dwarfs the previous puzzles by many thousands of orders of magnitude!"

23 of 80 comments (clear)

  1. Get off my lawn! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    In MY days, we were more than happy to have 2D and 3D!

    Damn kids these days!

    1. Re:Get off my lawn! by SimonGhent · · Score: 2, Funny

      2D? 3D?

      In my day we had one dimension and did we complain?

      (well, yes actually, but no one cared)

      --
      simon
    2. Re:Get off my lawn! by omeomi · · Score: 3, Funny

      I'm always happy when somebody comes out with a puzzle that nobody can solve (yet, I suppose). Makes me feel less stupid than not being able to solve the ones that tons of people can solve, like the Rubik's Cube.

      --
      ZuluPad, the wiki notepad on crack
    3. Re:Get off my lawn! by Conspiracy_Of_Doves · · Score: 5, Informative

      Allow me to shove your head under the putrescent waters of depression.

      Three year old solves rubik's cube in less than 2 minutes.
      6 year old solves rubik's cube in 40 seconds.
      Guy solves rubik's cube in 20 seconds with one hand.
      Guy solves rubik's cube in 50 seconds -- with his feet

      \I can't solve it either

      --

      Technoli
    4. Re:Get off my lawn! by Thelasko · · Score: 4, Funny

      In my day we had one dimension and did we complain? I did, it went something like this
      Dah-dah-dah Dah-dit Dit, Dah-di-dit Di-dit Dah-dah Dit Dah-dit Di-di-dit Di-dit Dah-dah-dah Dah-dit, Di-di-dit Di-di-dah Dah-di-dah-dit Dah-di-dah Di-di-dit Dah-di-dah-di-dah-dah
      Note: I couldn't use -. because of the lameness filter.
      --
      One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
    5. Re:Get off my lawn! by SwordsmanLuke · · Score: 5, Funny

      So, a few years back, I noticed some of my (less than genius) co-workers were playing with - and solving - the Rubik's Cube! I'd had a cube since I was a kid, but had never learned to solve it, but I figured if these guys could do it, I could do it. Over the next month I spent literally every free moment messing with the cube until I finally taught myself how to solve the damn thing. I was so proud.

      As a reward, I went out and bought a new cube, like the ones my co-workers had. I got it home, opened my new cube... and discovered that they come with instructions now.

      --
      Any plan which depends on a fundamental change in human behavior is doomed from the start.
    6. Re:Get off my lawn! by hairyfeet · · Score: 2, Interesting
      While I can understand how that might be appealing to you, don't forget that the real point of puzzles is to have fun while exercising your brain. I just wish I still had all my puzzles from the 80's craze. I had the cube,the snake,the barrel,the pyramid,etc. But somehow they got lost through the sands of time. The only one I have left is this one which I currently need to fix AGAIN,as my youngest nephew seems to think it's really funny to mess it up while I'm not looking.


      But don't let the fact that someone has solved it already deter you from enjoying a good puzzle. After all it is supposed to be fun,right? And if it makes you feel any better I had to buy a book to solve the damned cube. I never had trouble with the others but something about the cube just never clicked right in my brain. I guess my brain just doesn't do squares.

      --
      ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
    7. Re:Get off my lawn! by Hatta · · Score: 2, Interesting

      The rubiks cube is one of those puzzles that's easy to do once you figure out the process. In fact, figuring out the process is really the only interesting part of the puzzle, and once you know it there's not much point to doing it anymore.

      --
      Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
    8. Re:Get off my lawn! by Alpha830RulZ · · Score: 4, Funny

      I'm guessing you might have been distracted. We forgive you.

      --
      I was taught to respect my elders. The trouble is, it's getting harder and harder to find some.
    9. Re:Get off my lawn! by Nautical+Insanity · · Score: 3, Funny

      You know I was frustrated with the people who thought they knew how to solve Rubik's Cubes. So I went out and bought one, switched two of the corner tiles and gave it to people to solve. Nothing has ever satisfied the evil side of me more...other than putting tape on my cat's paw...

    10. Re:Get off my lawn! by Doggabone · · Score: 2, Funny

      You've got a point.

  2. I'm holding out by jayhawk88 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    For a true 4-dimensional Rubiks Cube, one that incorporates Time. Of course solving it will be incredibly disappointing, since after you do solve one, it turns out that it was solved all along.

    1. Re:I'm holding out by Shadow+Wrought · · Score: 5, Funny
      For a true 4-dimensional Rubiks Cube, one that incorporates Time.

      Or it could incorporate a thyme dimension. "It looks solved, but it just doesn't snmell solved..."

      --
      If brevity is the soul of wit, then how does one explain Twitter?
    2. Re:I'm holding out by omeomi · · Score: 2, Informative

      For a true 4-dimensional Rubiks Cube, one that incorporates Time. Of course solving it will be incredibly disappointing, since after you do solve one, it turns out that it was solved all along.

      Here you go, it's already been invented: http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/rubik.s-cube/the-idiots-cube-256889.php

      --
      ZuluPad, the wiki notepad on crack
    3. Re:I'm holding out by Tabernaque86 · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I imagine solving a puzzle involving Time as a variable would be much like l'espirit d'escalier: By the time you figure out a solution, it's too late to implement it unless you can travel back in time 10 minutes. If you try to use your solution now, you're just going to end up making a fool of yourself.

    4. Re:I'm holding out by Hal_Porter · · Score: 3, Funny

      - non-linear mutation of laws of physics. That's easy to deal with. You just remodulate the shield harmonics and then reverse the polarity of the neutron flow.
      --
      echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
    5. Re:I'm holding out by Trogre · · Score: 2, Funny

      Hmm, sounds like a job for the Sage math package.

      --
      "Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
  3. I have a marvelous solution to the 4D Megaminx by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    which this margin is too narrow to contain. Strangely the solution implies that if you have 4 integers x,y,z>0 and n>2 then x^n+y^n!=z^n, but I don't know why the heck that would be important.

  4. Re:Dag-nabbit by The+Master+Control+P · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Visualize our three dimensions as a bounded volume in 3-space. Then you can kind-of imagine the 4th and 5th spatial dimensions discreetly as 1- and 2-d arrays of such volumes.

  5. Now where... by jd · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ...have I seen this Megaminx puzzle before.... Oh yes, that's right, the US tax system. Seriously, this is wonderful. Once a problem is solved, then further work is merely optimization and refactoring. There's nothing new. Puzzles that have an algorithmic solution, but where the solution is unknown at this time, are interesting because they require discovery that is potentially within reach of anyone. Puzzles for which only a herustic definitely exists are also interesting for much the same reason. Problems with no solution, or where it is not yet possible to prove it is possible to find any solution, are interesting more because the work required might well involve whole new branches of mathematics being developed, real frontier work rather than simply filling in the gaps. Puzzles of this kind also draw people who might otherwise consider maths or science "boring" into those fields. Science outside of "profitable" fields like computer programming tend to rely on sparking the imagination of the next generation. There's no other reason to go into such a subject than the pursuit of knowledge, once you eliminate all status and monetary value.

    --
    It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
    1. Re:Now where... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      *sees wall of text*
      *looks at user id*
      *mods insightful*

  6. Re:is the analogy self-evident? by Culture20 · · Score: 3, Informative

    Ever played the latest Prince of Persia (Sands of Time) series? They were 3D games where you had to use another dimension (time travel) to navigate puzzles because things were [un]available in different times. Heck, go back to Zelda series for a 2D game where travel to a dream-world allows more freedom of movement.

  7. Re:Dag-nabbit by quickgold192 · · Score: 2, Informative

    actually, what we see on the screen is a two-dimensional representation of the three dimensional representation of the four-dimensional object :-/