18:46, Sunday 13 Apr., 2003 Link

Things about Penrose Tiles:

• The classic Penrose tiles consist of two rhombi ("Now that I am able to visualize five dimensional space in my head, I've noticed that I get a lot of weird looks from priests and small children").
• Penrose tiling patterns are pretty. If you carry on putting the two shapes next to each other, the pattern can grow forever.
• Some maths behind Penrose Tiles.
• A cellular automaton run on Penrose Tiles. Impressively crazy.
• Loads more Penrose Tiles links.

I had fun this weekend making my own. (And I have to get this down before I forget the sensation. That when I started putting the tiling together, I was getting holes after only two or three. The first patterns were nice, but it wasn't tessellating. Then I started seeing patterns and simularities and putting down the tiles became easier, but there was something else behind my eyes. Unarticulable hypotheses being created and tested. I felt shifted into a different world of interaction, shifted sideways. Making those original patterns was unworkable, I could see imperfections I hadn't noticed before. Certain configurations were ugly in ways I hadn't seen a minute or so earlier. It felt like learning a new computer language, only more fundamental; or reading a book from a different field, only less to do with words. As if all lever-like behaviour in the world because turning behaviour instead. Then it was time for dinner, and it was difficult because the act of laying down the tiles correctly was compelling. The pattern demanded to extend.)