5 Aug
2007
5 Aug
'07
11:31 p.m.
On Sunday 05 August 2007, Dan Asimov wrote:
[SPOILER] ... 1 / f-s = K 1 / f+s = 1 f-s = 1/K f+s = 1 f/s = 2f / 2s = 1+1/K / 1-1/K = K+1 / K-1 = 61/59
which makes 61 symbols. (This seems a lot more than ought to be necessary.)
If I'd done it on paper then I'd have written: (a+b)/(a-b) = 60 60a-60b = a+b and maybe also (for longer-term reference) 61/59. (In my head there would of course have been the intermediate step 59a = 61b, but I don't think I'd have bothered writing it.) So, treating 60 as a single symbol and including the parens, I'd have written probably 22 symbols. I don't know whether this says anything interesting about the difference between Dan's mental processes and mine. -- g