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Pac-Man's Ghost Behavior Algorithms
An anonymous reader writes "This article has a very interesting description of the algorithms behind the ghosts in Pac-Man. I had no idea about most of this information, but that's probably because it's difficult to study the ghosts when I die every 30 seconds. Quoting: 'The ghosts are always in one of three possible modes: Chase, Scatter, or Frightened. The "normal" mode with the ghosts pursuing Pac-Man is Chase, and this is the one that they spend most of their time in. While in Chase mode, all of the ghosts use Pac-Man's position as a factor in selecting their target tile, though it is more significant to some ghosts than others. In Scatter mode, each ghost has a fixed target tile, each of which is located just outside a different corner of the maze. This causes the four ghosts to disperse to the corners whenever they are in this mode. Frightened mode is unique because the ghosts do not have a specific target tile while in this mode. Instead, they pseudorandomly decide which turns to make at every intersection.'"
One great thing about hacker culture has always been the ideal that individuals are evaluated on their merits. How does the "Ms Pacman had no sense of direction because she was a Ms" type of thinking gel with this?
Now, you make a lot of good points there, many of which I agree with.
I agree that there has to be a distinction between harassment, and humour.
My concern is that its easy for people to accidentally create a culture which makes the people at the butt of the jokes feel bad. People often don't see that when they aren't at the receiving end.
The 'science' bit is irrelevant. I'm not in any way attacking the joke because of its scientific inaccuracy.
By way of analogy, statistically, black males have a higher tendency to do prison time in the united states. If the original context somehow the ghosts been in jail all the time, because they were black, would it be ok? What if slashdot had a strong neo-nazi sub-community - would that change how OK the joke was?
I think the context is important. I think in the current context of women feeling harassed in the open source community, we should think about whether such jokes are ok. There are few enough women in the community - thats fine, if thats their choice - but maybe we should err a little on the side of caution, to make sure the culture we create is welcoming for the rest?