Colloquium Announcement
Department of Mathematics
West Virginia University
for
Thursday, February 5, 1998, at 3:45pm
in 324 Armstrong Hall
(Tea and cookies begin at 3:00 in coffee room.)
Professor John Goldwasser
WVU
One Peg in the Center
The talk will be suitable for a general audience.
Students are strongly encouraged to participate.
Abstract
The game "Hi-Q" consists of a configuration of 33 holes
arranged in a "plus-shaped" pattern. You begin with 32
pegs filling all but the center hole. The object is to
"jump" over pegs, removing the jumped peg, until you are
left with one peg in the center. This talk will consider
the game of "Hi-Q" and some variations encountered in
Zambia and Nova Scotia. The focus will be on how to look
for mathematical structures which capture the essentials
of the configuration and rules of the game, so that they
can be used to decide whether or not you can "win" the game.
The talk REALLY IS for a general audience. No mathematical
background is needed. Most of the talk will be understandable
to a decent Math 3 or average Math 15 student. Yet there is
something in there for mathematicians as well.
The information on the future (and past) Colloquia can be also found on web at the
address:
http://www.math.wvu.edu/homepages/kcies/colloquium.html