A Solution for the Ten Letter Acrostic Puzzle? 258
rmo101 asks: "A story in the Times reports a solution to the ten letter acrostic square puzzle that has defied solution since the ancient Greeks. An acrostic puzzle comprises a square of letters where the arrangement of letters from words written in rows result in the same words appearing vertically in the same order. The ten letter solution, however, is not accepted by all as one of the words does not appear in a dictionary. Sounds like a puzzle in search of a fiendish algorithm for interrogating a dictionary. The ancient Greeks believed that the solver of the ten letter puzzle would become immortal. Anyone fancy their chances?" Of course, the Times article doesn't report the proposed ten-letter solution (they show a five-letter one), but they do mention the controversial word: "nonesevent". Are any of you interested in trying your hand at a better solution?
Article messed up the latin square (Score:5, Informative)
SATOR
AREPO
TENET
OPERA
ROTAS
Which is the vertical flip of the stories' version. This one spells out the sentence in the same direction as Latin would be written (top to bottom). Also, this one generates more hits on google, with 19900 versus 1320 hits (with "SATOR AREPO" versus "AREPO SATOR").
Re:Article messed up the latin square (Score:5, Informative)
The probable solve:
discu ssing
incan tator
scarl atina
carni tines
unlik eness
state swren
satin weave
itine rates
nones event
grass nests
What's up with slashdots lameness filter? The solution is lame now?
Re:Article messed up the latin square (Score:2, Informative)
The square mentioned in the Times was discovered quite a few years ago, as you mentioned - however it was indeed discovered by Ted, who is a likeable is
Re:Article messed up the latin square (Score:5, Insightful)
Lifetime of immortality? (Score:5, Funny)
that's useful, hm?
Re:Lifetime of immortality? (Score:3, Insightful)
Once it fails, that's the life over, hence no guarantee...
Re:Lifetime of immortality? (Score:2)
Re:Lifetime of immortality? (Score:2, Interesting)
One example would be program libraries. Just try to do something large without them.
Of course you could still do the same amount of work than before while using shortcuts, resulting in what you call "bottom line driven mindedness". But you *can* do
Solution to the solution (Score:5, Funny)
Duh (Score:2)
Re:Solution to the solution (Score:5, Funny)
Mod parent up (Score:5, Funny)
It's a simple enough solution - if you have a word with no meaning, just find one for it. Problem solved, the neologistical way!
Re:Mod parent up (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Solution to the solution (Score:2)
Re:Solution to the solution (Score:2, Redundant)
Re:Solution to the solution (Score:2)
Clarke's Conjecture (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Solution to the solution (Score:3, Funny)
perl.
Oh, and maybe whitespace [dur.ac.uk]
The solution (Score:5, Informative)
There are two others mentioned, one of which contains the word "Orangutang", which is also mentioned in the Times article. Interestingly, this directory listing [gtoal.com] implies that the BENCHMARK file, which contains the above solution, was created no later than November 1999. Sorry - but I can't stop the ecode tage from inserting spaces into the text.
Re:The solution (Score:2)
Re:The solution (Score:2)
But if you solve it now - using a computer or otherwise - the best you will get is a mention i a online newspaper article. Today nobody cares about how smart you are.
Re:The solution (Score:2)
Unless you do it in polynomial time, in which case the men in black would like a word with you.
Re:The solution (Score:2)
Solution not valid (Score:5, Funny)
Long live Wikipedia.
Just add the word, and the puzzle is solved.
Probably the ancient greeks solved it too once, since out of frustration comes the simple answer:
AAAAAAAAAA
AAAAAAAAAA
AAAAAAAAAA
AAAAAAAAAA
AAAAAAAAAA
AAAAAAAAAA
AAAAAAAAAA
AAAAAAAAAA
AAAAAAAAAA
AAAAAAAAAA
Re:Solution not valid (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Solution not valid (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Solution not valid (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Solution not valid (Score:2)
So does Urban Dictionary.
So does Merriam-Webster Open Dictionary.
What's wrong with "nonesevent?" (Score:4, Funny)
Re:What's wrong with "nonesevent?" (Score:2)
It's a perfectly cromulent [wikipedia.org] word.
-Adam
Re:What's wrong with "nonesevent?" (Score:5, Funny)
Re:What's wrong with "nonesevent?" (Score:2)
Easy, heres one with a 2 byte wordsize: (Score:5, Funny)
0000000000000010 - sure is great
0000000000000000 - there are carrots
0000000000000000 - on my plate
0000000000000000 - I have a buick
0000000000000000 - which I hate
0000000000000000 - I cut my kittens
0000000000000000 - into bait
0000000000000000 - la la la la
0000000000000000 - lameness filter
0000000000000000 - is this enough yet?
0000000000000000 - I realize the kitten line
0000000000000000 - may be a bit offensive
0000000000000000 - I'm a supporter of felinism, I swear
0100000000000010 - I just think that a kitten's place
0000000000000001 - is in the kitchen)
I don't see the big deal. How is this one of the big puzzles in computer science again?
Re:Easy, heres one with a 2 byte wordsize: (Score:4, Informative)
What's the difference in computing a square where each position can be 1 of 2 values, vs 1 of 26??? We should only have to deal with the upper half of the square (as it needs to be diagonal)
So, for a square of size 10 you are looking at 55 open positions. The binary case has 2^55 possibilities. A mere 36,028,797,018,963,968 different squares that need to be checked. If you only use 26 letters you are looking at 26^55 different squares! That's 6.66091878 × 10^77 different squares. Even on a network of computers (seti@home, supercomputers, whatever) that is still going to take a loooong time.
The problem itself is super easy to run through a computer, it just takes years and years of time to compute. It's the same reason that the major encryption schemes still work. Their formulas may be known, but if you don't know the factors of a number with a thousand digits in it, you can't break it. The real kicker is no one has developed a method for finding factors quickly (at least quickly enough to make encryption obsolete!)
Re:Easy, heres one with a 2 byte wordsize: (Score:3, Interesting)
thinking too hard here... (Score:2)
Re:Easy, heres one with a 2 byte wordsize: (Score:3, Interesting)
Yeah, that seems to be a common sentiment here. That's because apparently nobody here took an algorithms class.
Yes, it wouldn't be that difficult to create an algorithm that would theoretically solve this problem. I say "theoretically" because this assumes that you have infinite time and infinite memory.
Exhaustively testing all the combinations from a dictionary of 10-letter words would have such an astronomical co
Just wait a year (Score:4, Funny)
"Noun;The only word in the 2005 ten-letter acrostic solution which did not appear in a dictionary at the time."
Re:Just wait a year (Score:2)
I nominate: nonesevant, noun, Pronounced: NUN-sev-ant, Possessing horrifyingly-bad managerial skills, as in Dilbert's pointy-haired boss was a nonesevant twit. See: nonesevance, renonesevance (like recidivism, falling back into pointy-hairedness), noneseveral, noneseved, and (of course) nonesense (a misguided belief that you're a good
Attention, this is the NSA (Score:2, Funny)
Abra-Melin? (Score:4, Interesting)
One which stuck in mind goes as follows:
ALLUP
LEIRU
LIGIL
URIEL
PULLA
When ritually consecrated they are said to be capable of producing magic effects; at least according to the mystics.
Re:Abra-Melin? (Score:2)
And if you believe that, I have a ten-letter acrostic (comes with free lifetime immortality) you may be interested in buying...
Re:Abra-Melin? (Score:2, Interesting)
That being said, I've never actually read any Abra-Melin grimoire [wikipedia.org]. Instead, the article reminded me of a chapter from a book I read when younger entitled The Encyclopedia of Mind, Magic & Mysteries (isbn: 0-86318-639-4).
The aforementioned "magic square" was printed on page 100.
Not in dictionary? Nonsense. (Score:2, Redundant)
Re:Not in dictionary? Nonsense. (Score:2)
Sounds like something a kwyjibo would say.
Anient Greeks? (Score:3, Interesting)
Gee, um... I bet it's either less or more difficult to do it in Ancient Greek than in English. Or maybe they ancient Greeks did it in English too?
Also, as the article states, one of his words does not appear in the dictionary. Now, maybe it's just me, but using words not found in the dictionary seems to make this task a little bit easier. He is basically saying "No one could solve this using real words, but I did using a (fake) one".
Re:Anient Greeks? (Score:2)
Re:Anient Greeks? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Anient Greeks? (Score:2)
:)
Only the Fool... (Score:5, Interesting)
Only the fool would take trouble to verify that his sentence was composed of ten a's, three b's, four c's, four d's, forty-six e's, sixteen f's, four g's, thirteen h's, fifteen i's, two k's, nine l's, four m's, twenty-five n's, twenty-four o's, five p's, sixteen r's, forty-one s's, thirty-seven t's, ten u's, eight v's, eight w's, four x's, eleven y's, twenty-seven commas, twenty-three apostrophes, seven hyphens and, last but not least, a single !
There's got to be a piece of math that finds the positions where all constraints are satisfied as in the above quote.
Re:Only the Fool... (Score:2)
Re:Only the Fool... (Score:2)
Re:Only the Fool... (Score:2)
Re:Only the Fool... (Score:2)
A lifetime of immortality? (Score:3, Funny)
"nonesevent" not in google (Score:4, Funny)
Re:"nonesevent" not in google (Score:2, Insightful)
From m-w.com
Main Entry: 4none
Pronunciation: 'nOn
Function: noun
Usage: often capitalized
Etymology: Late Latin nona, from Latin, 9th hour of the day from sunrise -- more at NOON
: the fifth of the canonical hours
A google define:nones query results in:
# n the old Roman calendar, the ninth day before Ides. The 7th of March, May, July and October and the 5th of other months. See Calends, Nones & Ides
www.highdown.reading.sch.uk/highdown/pupil/time/ca lendars/terms.html
# the 5th or 7th
Re:"nonesevent" not in google (Score:2)
No NES event? (Score:2, Funny)
One slight difference (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:One slight difference (Score:2)
LanguageLog notes issues in the story (Score:5, Interesting)
There's no evidence that the composition of word squares, let alone 10-squares, was a pastime in ancient Greece.
And, there's the timeliness of the article:
[I]t's unclear why the Times thought that this was at all newsworthy, considering that Clarke announced his discovery of the square back in April 1999, in an issue of his e-zine WordsWorth.
Re:LanguageLog notes issues in the story (Score:2)
Certainly people can't have made much progress on it for 2 millennia or so, until English had evolved and modern English spelling had been invented.
Tabloid format, tabloid thinking.
Re:LanguageLog notes issues in the story (Score:2)
german... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:I know you're joking, but... (Score:2)
SATOR SATOR
AREPO AREPO
TENET TENET
OPERA OPERA
ROTAS ROTAS
SATOR SATOR
AREPO AREPO
TENET TENET
OPERA OPERA
ROTAS ROTAS
I don't speak german and subsequently couldn't find any german example puzzles, but presuming you found four 5x5 puzzles with combinable words, how does this not work? I mean, sure it might be said to fail due to the compound word rule, but it does seem to simply combine the words quite neatly.
Re:I know you're joking, but... (Score:2)
Problem solved.
Etymology nazi! (Score:2)
In other words, he combined two Latin-based words to solve an English version of a Greek puzzle.
Suddenly, English [mithrilstar.org] neologisms [ucam.org] that combine Latin and Greek don't bother me at all.
They Were Right About the Whole Immortality Thing (Score:4, Funny)
Sparse space (Score:5, Interesting)
I've actually written a program to generate the Dutch solutions to the 5x5 puzzle somewhere around 1990, and it found several good solutions with a 210,000 word dictionary. However, it didn't find solutions for the 6x6 square. So I would expect that the 10x10 square is near impossible, unless wacky compounds would be allowed, since they are the only thing that can keep the letter combination filled...
Re:Sparse space (Score:2)
How does the time needed to find all NxN solutions grow with N?
Re: Sparse space (Score:2)
A more efficient algorithm (Score:2)
(1) Calculate all the possibilities for the first five words
(2) Calculate all the possibilities for the last five words
(3) Look for a compatible pair
You can filter the possibilities down quite a lot before you start match-finding. And you can do this recursively to a certain extent.
Green blackboards and other anomalies (Score:2)
10 Letter Words (Score:3, Informative)
http://aaron.doosh.net/lexicon/10LetterWords.html [doosh.net]
cruel (Score:4, Funny)
Language? (Score:3, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Orangutang (Score:4, Interesting)
And the real solution to the problem seems obvious. Considering that the term "Cyber Monday" was only created two weeks ago but is now being reported by all the major news organizations as a real thing, it would seem to me that all one needs to do to solve this problem is to work out a solution where one or two of the words look reasonably well formed and sound ok even if they are in no dictionary. Then start using them, work them into some blogs, get them some mention in the news, and wait a year or two for them to show up as new words in the dictionary (what's a year or two to an immortal?) Problem solved.
Re:Orangutang (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Orangutang (Score:2)
Re:Orangutang (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Orangutang (Score:2)
I fully expect to see the word cromulent in the dictionary before I die.
Re:Orangutang (Score:2)
Of course, that will also be the day I shoot myself in the head.
Re:Orangutang (Score:2)
Re:Orangutan (Score:2)
Bastards (Score:2)
Squares are fun. (Score:2)
ON - NO
NO - ON
net - ewe - ten
ewe - wow - ewe
ten - ewe - net
Then a hypercube...
Some code to play with (Score:2)
Yes, it's bad code, in a language poorly suited for the task. And really inefficient. Probably has bugs, too. Blow me. I was bored and wanted something fast.
Re:Some code to play with (Score:2)
using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Text;
using System.IO;
class AcrosticSolver
{
static void Main(string[] args)
{
AcrosticFinder(0);
}
const int PuzzleSize = 10;
static Dictionary dictionary = new Dict
Homework (Score:2)
On a similar note, Will Shortz, on the NPR Sunday morning show asked a few weeks back for word squares (but without the symmetry) but where instead of each cell containing letters, it contains the symbols for the chemical elements. Someday that or a variant of it could well be another good homework assignment/programming contest problem.
Wrong Language (Score:5, Insightful)
Greeks? (Score:2)
Duh
That's Easy! (Score:2)
COWBOYNEAL
Is English Valid a Solution? (Score:2)
The Greeks invented this puzzle and seemed to think it was impossible -- in Greek. I do not see how solving it in English would count for anything.
If one could use any language, why not use Hawaiian or some other Polynesian language. With few vowels and consonants, it should be relatively easy construct one of these things.
Non-Greek solutions should be invalid.
Re:the purpose of puzzles (Score:2)
Re:Jut make a program... (Score:4, Funny)
Yes, but what happens when you have a million computers connected to each other and granted immortality?
Skynet..
Re:Jut make a program... (Score:2)
Or someone will take 5 seconds to realize that the slowest part would be putting a dictionary onto a computer, and with that step already completed a single computer could do all the possible permutations in a very short ammount of time... no grid computing needed.
Obviously! (Score:2)
Re:Immortal my ass (Score:2)