Together with
Steve Beard, Jeff Noon devised the writing game Mappalujo. The set of rules can be
made applicable (with minor changes) to other situations such as :
writing a mathematical paper or book with a co-author, an idea for a
group-blog or it might be fun to run a seminar with two lecturers
following this idea. All one needs is a good choice of ghosts, perhaps
adding some order structure on them… Needless to say that
mappalujo is (via mamalujo) another tribute to Joyce. Back in the old
UIA-days we shared a building and more importantly a library with the
languages departments. There were times that I took out more Dutch and
English novels and Buffalo
Notebooks than math-books. I’m happy to see that one of my
favourite books The Sigla of Finnegans Wake by McHugh is
now available online. If you ever wondered where my fascination for
strange notation comes from have a look here and if
you want to know more about Mamalujo, read the relevant chapter.
Category: stories
sudoku mania (bis)
Published September 27, 2005 by lievenlb
Situation : my first class this year, about 20
fresh(wo)men, their second class this year.
Me : Okay, who
did some mathematics this vacation?
(No response
obviously, even if they did, it’s not a cool thing to
admit…)
Me : Sure, let me rephrase the question :
who thought about solving a puzzle or played a strategic game this
vacation?
(No response, or… is there?….. a
timid question :
‘Does Sudoku
count????’
Me : Well, not really but okay
let’s rephrase the question : Who solved at least 1 Sudoku this
vacation?
IMMEDIATE RESPONSE : about three quarters of all
students waving their arms!
Me :
Oof…….Oh…….Yes??? (to an even more timid
student raising his arm)
‘Does doing half a Sudoku
also counts?’
It’s going to be a tough
semester…
nymphomation
Published September 26, 2005 by lievenlb
If you prefer Neal Stephenson’s Snow crash to his bestseller Cryptonomicon you may have a fun time reading through Jeff Noon’s Nymphomation.
In a
‘parallel’ 1999’s Manchester, blurbflies (blurb stands for Bio-logical-Ultra-Robotic-Broadcasting-System) fill the air chanting their slogans, especially for _DominoBones_, the new lottery game which is on a year trial run in Manchester before going National.
A group of mathematics students are searching for the hidden mysteries behind the game. Their promotor is Prof. Max(imus) Hackle who has written a series of psychedelic sixties papers in a `journal’ called _Number Gumbo: A Mathemagical Grimoire_ with titles like “The No-Win Labyrinth: A solution to any such Hackle maze”, “Maze Dynamics and DNA Codings, a special theory of
Nymphomation” and “Fourth-Dimensional Orgasms and the Casanova Effect.”
He is also keen on using fun-terminology defining processes happening in the ‘Hackle maze’ and as such is a bit like John Conway. In fact, Conway’s Game of Life is a lot like Hackle’s maze.
There is some statistics and game theory in the book but the plot and ending are that of a good Postcyberpunk
novel, that is rather chaotic depending on possible future technological advances rather than the logical and unescapable ending of a good whodunnit.
After reading Nymphomation, a fly or a game of dominoes will never seem quite the same again.
Another nice feature are the non-sensical beginning sentences of every ‘chapter’. To some they seem like the rantings of a mad mathematician. To me they sound like a tribute to Finnegan’s Wake…
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