SMS scnews item created by Gareth White at Mon 1 Jun 2009 1819
Type: Seminar
Distribution: World
Expiry: 3 Jun 2009
Calendar1: 3 Jun 2009 1300-1400
CalLoc1: Carslaw 452
Auth: garethw@asti.maths.usyd.edu.au

SUMS Meeting: Wilcox -- N-dimensional Rubik’s Cubes

Hello SUMS members,
 
Thankyou to everyone who came to watch me attempt to give a talk. I 
apologise for timing it so badly (believe it or not it was actually timed 
worse when I first gave the talk last year). If I ever give the talk again I 
will probably focus more on the cranks and less on the paradoxes (since 
everyone seems to know the paradoxes anyway). By the way, if anybody wants 
to ask any questions about my talk, feel free to email me.
 
For the last SUMS event of the semester, we will be having another talk (our 
3rd talk in a row). I was planning on ending the semester with a super 
non-talk event, but instead it will be a super TALK instead (the non-talk 
event is being postponed). So don’t get disappointed, this one promises to 
be awesome. Stewart Wilcox has come all the way from Harvard University to 
tell you about N-dimensional Rubik’s Cubes (seriously he arrived here on 
Friday), a talk which he has given many times at Harvard (as well as SUMS, 
many years ago). Stewart is no crank either, because he actually solves 
(previously unsolved) conjectures in his spare time.
 
In any case, I’m sure you all know what Rubik’s Cubes are. They’re those 
twisty puzzles with 9 squares per face, where the aim is to make all 9 
squares the same colour (for all 6 faces). Many of you own one of these 
3-dimensional puzzles, and many of you even know how to solve one. But what 
about 4-dimensional Rubik’s Cubes, or 5-D, or higher? What do they look 
like? And how on Earth do you solve one?
 
Come to Wednesday’s talk to find out.
 
Talk: N-dimensional Rubik’s Cubes
Speaker: Stewart Wilcox
Location: Carslaw 452
Date/Time: Wednesday June 3, 1-2pm
 
Hope to see you there!
 
SUMS President