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Path: utzoo!linus!security!genrad!mit-eddie!rh
From: rh@mit-eddie.UUCP (Randy Haskins)
Newsgroups: net.flame
Subject: Re: (about 3 levels of indirection), and 'transitive closures'
Message-ID: <576@mit-eddie.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 11-Aug-83 12:00:52 EDT
Article-I.D.: mit-eddi.576
Posted: Thu Aug 11 12:00:52 1983
Date-Received: Fri, 12-Aug-83 05:36:33 EDT
References: <258@princeton.UUCP>
Organization: MIT, Cambridge, MA
Lines: 31

It's interesting that this should be brought up at this time.  A few
days ago, a friend of mine was talking about a 'Jane Doe Fan Club.'
(The name of this person has been changed to protect us all.)  I
had heard about it some years ago, but I had forgotten about it, so
I asked him what he meant.  He told me that I was in it, and I told
him I had never had relations with her.  He explained that the way
you were a member was if there was a path from you to her, and that
a girl I had slept with had a known path.  (Precedence of operations
doesn't matter for this, so isn't strictly transitive.)  As a friend
of mine best described it:
    1)  Jane Doe is a member of the Jane Doe Fan Club
    2)  Anyone who has ever (at any time) had sexual relations with
        anyone who is currently a member, is a member.
This is a good recursive definition (i luv lisp).  The network formed
from this is sort of like an X-rated version of the USENET (:-) and
it has some interesting ramifications.  For example through a wierd
twist of fate, I think that there exists a path from me to my
mother (and therefore my father)(No, I haven't committed incest.).
If I have a path to my father, then my network is very vast indeed.
It's kind of fun to think about, and I'm putting on my asbestos suit
to guard against all the Bible-thumpers and other 'moralists' who
are going to flame at me for turning sex into a 'cheap thrill.'
Of course, anyone who uses the USENETwork has turned computing into
a 'cheap thrill.' :-)
	Flame on, uptite peepul
-- 
	Randwulf (Randy Haskins)
	genrad!mit-eddie!rh
 or...
  rh@mit-ee (via mit-mc)