The blog post was inspired by The Recursive Universe by William Poundstone. I read this book years ago and found it amazing. I recently read another book by him, Fortune’s Formula, which features the Kelly Criterion, Claude Shannon beating roulette, card counting in blackjack, and the surprising origins of Warner Bros. Recommended for sure. Thanks to the HN poster who suggested it.
Heh, I remember reading William Poundstone's books "Big Secrets" and "Bigger Secrets" as a kid (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Secrets ). They're mostly about debunking or explaining various urban legends and conspiracy theories. I'm not sure how well they've stood the test of time, but they definitely had a formative impact on my thinking in a way that I only suddenly realized upon reading his name thirty some years later.
A highly inspiring book, for sure. In my own case, it has led to a handful of blog posts about HashLife, a literate programming implementation, implementing Life on a Turing Machine, and of course, Conway’s passing from COVID-19 led to a post about FRACTRAN and the Collatz Conjecture.
We may not break new ground, but when we read about something and are inspired to write code and play with ideas, we engage with the idea at a deeper level than simply reading to comprehend.
