Thread for basic questions

confocaloid · Post by **confocaloid** » June 29th, 2024, 11:11 am

Since the quoted post was just edited today (I got a notification) and I have no idea what exactly changed, and I apparently didn't reply to that post before, I thought it might be a good idea to reply now.

Why does this particular Life configuration need a name? Why is it singled out for a name? (Especially with all recent discoveries and with potential for future discoveries.)
Trying to name patterns/reactions discovered by someone else, instead of leaving that to the discoverer, only makes things more problematic.
Trying to get actual names/usernames of living people involved into naming of patterns/reactions, especially without checking their opinion on the issue, makes things much more problematic.

I think this conduit (just like most other conduits) shouldn't get any name at all, at least unless and until the actual discoverer chooses a name and posts about that.

It's perfectly possible to make a stamp collection of available components, without having names for any of those components.

dvgrn wrote: April 15th, 2024, 4:00 pm
confocaloid wrote: April 15th, 2024, 3:45 pm
dvgrn wrote: April 15th, 2024, 3:31 pm[...]
Possibly we could get away with a LifeWiki article for it under just "Transparent Turner" to go with "Scorbie Splitter"?
Which would have the exact same problem as using spiral growth or glider loop or p45 pi-heptomino hassler for an article about a specific pattern (as opposed to a general concept).
Yeah, it's not perfect -- it would have to be a full name something like "Extrementhusiast's Transparent Turner", with "Transparent Turner" as the alliterative memorable everyday-use form (which could redirect to "Extrementhusiast's Transparent Turner").

However, I don't really have naming rights on the thing, myself. I'd just like it to have an easy-to-remember name that I can look up, because it's so useful to have a simple neo-Spartan merge circuit for each category (color-changing and color-preserving.)
[...]

Post by **dvgrn** » June 29th, 2024, 11:55 am

confocaloid wrote: June 29th, 2024, 11:11 am Since the quoted post was just edited today (I got a notification) and I have no idea what exactly changed, and I apparently didn't reply to that post before, I thought it might be a good idea to reply now.

Why does this particular Life configuration need a name? Why is it singled out for a name? (Especially with all recent discoveries and with potential for future discoveries.)
...
dvgrn wrote: April 15th, 2024, 4:00 pm However, I don't really have naming rights on the thing, myself. I'd just like it to have an easy-to-remember name that I can look up, because it's so useful to have a simple neo-Spartan merge circuit for each category (color-changing and color-preserving.)
[...]

The message from me that you quoted, with this earlier message from the same thread, was my attempt to answer that question.

The part of that message that I added today was the final line:

'And if "Martin's Merger" or some such starts to gain currency, it's easy to include that later.'

I put that in because it would make that post show up if anyone searched for "Martin's Merger" -- I had originally written "Martin's Merge(r)", which only shows up on a search for "Martin's Merge"... and "Martin's Merge" isn't nearly as searchable a name, because there are various false-positive hits that show up due to the commonness of those two words.

I needed to refer to that specific neo-Spartan merge circuit in my Construction Practice post this morning -- and Extrementhusiast hasn't showed up to give it an official name in the meantime.

My post acknowledges that I don't have naming rights, any more than I did for the Scorbie Splitter. But Martin's Merger is a uniquely small and useful neo-Spartan merge circuit, and it's a handy part of the same toolkit that includes the Scorbie Splitter -- so I don't think there's any harm in me personally referring to it as Martin's Merger until and unless a better or more official easy-to-remember name comes along.

d/dx · Post by **d/dx** » June 30th, 2024, 10:07 am

Is this spaceship growing? I can't tell.