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Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxl!houxm!vax135!cornell!uw-beaver!tektronix!hplabs!hplabsb!minsky
From: minsky@hplabsb.UUCP (Yair Minsky)
Newsgroups: net.math
Subject: Re: Dot Town, U.S.A.
Message-ID: <2484@hplabsb.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 29-Aug-84 20:43:15 EDT
Article-I.D.: hplabsb.2484
Posted: Wed Aug 29 20:43:15 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 1-Sep-84 10:54:55 EDT
Organization: Hewlett Packard Labs, Palo Alto CA
Lines: 25

Doug Gwinn is correct in that everyone will kill themselves
eventually after the stranger arrives, although he did not
state his reasoning or the exact number of days that the
process will take (it depends on the actual number of blue
dots).

He is wrong, however, in concluding that the stranger imparts
no information by his statement. This is a tricky point, but
I believe the way to think about it is that the information
imparted by the stranger is not just about the number of dots
but also about the possible reasoning processes available to 
the good people of Dot Town. That, in fact, is the beauty of
this puzzle.

I don't want to say any more for fear of spoiling the puzzle, 
but at any rate I don't think there is any insoluble dilemma
involved.

				Enjoy,
				Yair Minsky

PS By the way, the additional properties suggested after the original
   posting are correct. I hadn't included them because they seemed
   reasonably implicit, but looking back I guess I was wrong.