ReferenceFinder: Find coordinates on a piece of paper with only folds

(mutsuntsai.github.io)

65 points | by icwtyjj 4 days ago ago

9 comments

  • srean 8 hours ago ago

    Folding is more powerful than ruler and compass constructions. One can do cube roots, angle trisections and more.

    Coincidentally enough, I had mentioned straight edge and ruler constructions in a different thread a few minutes ago

    https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47112418

    Related older thread

    https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45222882

  • Ecco 11 hours ago ago

    That is really cool. I wish it had an animated video to display the result, that'd be even easier to follow and therefore even more impressive.

    • Alifatisk 9 hours ago ago

      Maybe possible with that DSL the YouTube channel 3Blue1Brown created?

  • amelius 11 hours ago ago

    Is this brute forcing, or is there more to it?

    • PowerElectronix 10 hours ago ago

      There's more to it. Origami as a calculation tool is more powerful than compass and straight edge.

      • CrazyStat 4 hours ago ago

        Is there? I followed the link[1] to the original author of the desktop software this web app is derived from, and he says:

        > To make a long story short, by the third generation of ReferenceFinder (written in 2003), I had incorporated all 7 of the Huzita-Justin Axioms of folding into the program, allowing it to potentially explore all possible folding sequences consisting of sequential alignments that each form a single crease in a square of paper. Of course, the family tree of such sequences grows explosively (or to be precise, exponentially); but the concomitant growth in the availability of computing horsepower has made it possible to explore a reasonable subset of that exponential family tree, and in effect, by pure brute force, find a close approximation to any arbitrary point or line within a unit square using a very small number of folds.

        (emphasis added)

        [1] https://langorigami.com/article/referencefinder/

  • JKCalhoun 10 hours ago ago

    I enjoy when HN surfaces out-of-the-box type stuff like this. Very cool.

    • scoot 6 hours ago ago

      “outside of the box”?

  • analog8374 4 hours ago ago

    Folding could be called a superset of measuring.

    Measuring could be called a special case of folding (it's an accordian fold)