(auto): An interesting twist for fans of cellular automata: Minesweeper as the basis for computation. Richard Kaye has studied Minesweeper as a foundation for building logic components and Turing machines, and has therefore made connections between it and the theory of algorithms.

Minesweeper mathematics

Sunday 31 March 2002This is over 23 years old. Be careful.

An interesting twist for fans of cellular automata: Minesweeper as the basis for computation. Richard Kaye has studied Minesweeper as a foundation for building logic components and Turing machines, and has therefore made connections between it and the theory of algorithms. I don’t fully understand all the P and NP stuff, and there’s clearly nothing practical about it, but there’s something about this that tickles my geek funnybone.

I found this through the Clay Mathematics Institute, which has a more approachable description of the work as part of their prize problems: They’re offering million-dollar prizes for solving hard classic math problems. Sharpen your pencils!

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