John Smith

101 reputation

	101 reputation	bio	website		visits	member for	2 years, 6 months
1 badges		location			seen	Feb 16 '12 at 1:20

5 Actions

Nov 22	comment	Strategy for solving “Lights Out” puzzle I think the reason 5x5 lights out is so captivating is that people look for symmetric solutions and fail. The other dimensions have more symmetry.
Nov 22	comment	Strategy for solving “Lights Out” puzzle But look at how much fewer symmetries the solution has compared to the question, and the answer.
Nov 22	comment	Strategy for solving “Lights Out” puzzle @badp The solution from all lights on to lights off is very non-symmetric. Or maybe there's some other definition of symmetry I'm missing. My point is that symmetric games do no necessarily have symmetric solutions. They could, as in you example, the all-lights solution can never be found by considering symmetric solutions. So you need to look at possible non-symmetric solutions. (my fermat thing is from that the solution is awful even though the question is easy, everyone was looking for a nice elegant solution)
Nov 22	awarded	Editor
Nov 22	comment	Strategy for solving “Lights Out” puzzle @badp I take issue with that symmetric games have symmetric solutions. It has no basis in reality (witness Fermat's Last Theorem). Lights Out does not have a symmetric solution. Look at orion.math.iastate.edu:80/burkardt/puzzles/…