in reply to Re: Hofstadter Metapuzzle
in thread (OT) Hofstadter Metapuzzle

Nice work. Iterative processes are hit-or-miss with these sorts of problems, though. They depend on your initial state, can degenerate into cycles, and are not necessarily capable of producing all possible solutions. I wonder if this program can be tweaked to produce the second solution? 
   MeowChow                                   
               s aamecha.s a..a\u$&owag.print

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Re^3: Hofstadter Metapuzzle
by tadman (Prior) on May 23, 2002 at 00:29 UTC
    Some puzzles like this don't settle into a steady state, leaving the logical equivalent of a "flip-flop" circuit, the classic paradoxical "This statement is false."-type problem, or two self-defeating, self-reinforcing arrangements like in the "Life" game.

    I think if you seed the initial statement differently, it might settle on a different possibility, though of course, this particular implementation uses the underscores for placement, so that will have to change.
[reply]
      Sure, you can seed it with the second solution :) 
         MeowChow                                   
               s aamecha.s a..a\u$&owag.print
[reply]

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