3 ms·

This anecdote is memorably presented as an application of modular arithmetic (along with the behavior of Enigma machine rotors) in Neal Stephenson’s Cryptonomic

This anecdote is memorably presented as an application of modular arithmetic (along with the behavior of Enigma machine rotors) in Neal Stephenson’s Cryptonomicon. See the discussion in this review of the book: https://www.ams.org/notices/199911/rev-kasman.pdf https://www.ams.org/notices/199911/rev-kasman.pdf

lelandfe 4y ago
I have a love/hate relationship with his writing – he adores going off on tangents, and action often gets put on pause while he savors them (REAMDE has several long paragraphs of a character pulling themselves onto a boat, admiring the hull, praising the usefulness of the tires lashed to it, etc). But it also introduces me to so many lovely things in the process. That moment in Cryptonomicon was quite cool.
- ravi-delia 4y ago
  It's funny, I almost feel the opposite. I love the little weird tangents, but something about the expository bits never squared with me. Not sure why
- idontwantthis 4y ago
  Reamde is the only book of his I couldn’t get through.
phaedrus 4y ago
Your mention of modular arithmetic makes me draw a connection between this story and the way I think about ceiling fan pull chains. Suppose the fan is clearly starting on high and you want to turn it off, but you don't know if the order of settings is "high-low-off", or "high-medium-low-off" (three states or four). It's often difficult to tell if the fan is coasting off or just spinning down to low. If you get it wrong and pull one time too many, it goes back to high and you have to start over. Therefore I always pull fan chains eleven (11) times to turn them off, so that I don't have to know if it's a three or four state fan. (Also works for on-off pull chains.) Pulling the chain 59 times would extend this technique to cover five-state fans, but I've never encountered one.
- burner556 4y ago
  I just smash my hand in the blades after each pull of the chain and eyeball the acceleration when it starts moving again. Who’s with me?!
- Arrath 4y ago
  ...huh. Well, I am going to try this.
filoeleven 4y ago
I had just assumed that this was Neal working more necessary maths into the book with an amusing anecdote attributed to Turing. Given that this blog post is from this year, I’m going to continue to assume as much.

lelandfe 4y ago

I have a love/hate relationship with his writing – he adores going off on tangents, and action often gets put on pause while he savors them (REAMDE has several long paragraphs of a character pulling themselves onto a boat, admiring the hull, praising the usefulness of the tires lashed to it, etc). But it also introduces me to so many lovely things in the process. That moment in Cryptonomicon was quite cool.

ravi-delia 4y ago
It's funny, I almost feel the opposite. I love the little weird tangents, but something about the expository bits never squared with me. Not sure why
idontwantthis 4y ago
Reamde is the only book of his I couldn’t get through.

phaedrus 4y ago

Your mention of modular arithmetic makes me draw a connection between this story and the way I think about ceiling fan pull chains. Suppose the fan is clearly starting on high and you want to turn it off, but you don't know if the order of settings is "high-low-off", or "high-medium-low-off" (three states or four). It's often difficult to tell if the fan is coasting off or just spinning down to low. If you get it wrong and pull one time too many, it goes back to high and you have to start over. Therefore I always pull fan chains eleven (11) times to turn them off, so that I don't have to know if it's a three or four state fan. (Also works for on-off pull chains.) Pulling the chain 59 times would extend this technique to cover five-state fans, but I've never encountered one.

burner556 4y ago
I just smash my hand in the blades after each pull of the chain and eyeball the acceleration when it starts moving again. Who’s with me?!
Arrath 4y ago
...huh. Well, I am going to try this.

filoeleven 4y ago

I had just assumed that this was Neal working more necessary maths into the book with an amusing anecdote attributed to Turing. Given that this blog post is from this year, I’m going to continue to assume as much.