Diving into the depths of a Rubik’s Cube

 

The Rubik’s Cube, the most famous puzzle, was invented in the year 1974 by a professor of architecture Erno Rubik. This Cube is the most sold out puzzle till date and is considered one of the hardest puzzles to solve. It is very popular among teenagers who spend days and nights solving it. The Rubik’s Cube was a 3x3x3 set of puzzles. When Erno Rubik invented his first Rubik’s Cube, he took 3 months to solve it himself as he found it very challenging. The puzzle was originally advertised as having "over 3,000,000,000 (three billion) combinations but only one solution". Depending on how combinations are counted, the actual number is significantly higher.

The Cube has 6 faces which are covered with nine stickers, each one of six solid colors: white, yellow, red, orange, blue, green. Some later versions of the Cube used plastic panels instead of stickers to reduce the chances of wear and tear. The Cube has an internal pivot mechanism that enables each individual face to move. For the puzzle to be solved each individual color should get back to its original position so that all the same colors should be in one face. The Cube had certain algorithms (well defined steps) to solve certain cases but it was mostly logic.

By the year 1990 most people solved the cube and many peoplwere competing for the fastest times. In 2004, The World Cube Association, an international governing body of the Rubik’s Cube was established which organized competitions worldwide and recognized many world records.

The Cube was further updated into many different sizes like the 2x2x2 to 22x22x22 which used the similar logic as the 3x3x3 but was much harder and more challenging than the 3x3x3. (Description)

The pertinent question here is: “Why learnhow to solve a cube”. So aAccording to scientific research, solving the Rubik’s Cube actually improved the solver’s mental state and mentalintuition with a significant increase in their thinking and reasoning skills. This helped many of the “Cuber’s” to increase and improve their concentration. The Rubik’s Cube is one of the most effective way to keep one’s brain active.      and it didn’t matter if that person were a speedcuber.

 Many Cuber’s not only use the Cube as a stress buster but also to increase their Capacity power of analysis as solving a Cube has its own benefits.

I, myself started solving the Cube in 2017 and took more than 5 months to finish my first cube. Over the years, I gradually started moving on to bigger sized cubes and made “Speedcubing “my personal and most favorite hobby.

To conclude, A Rubik’s Cube is not merely a toy but a revolutionary invention and is considered a mathematical invention by many scientists.

~Rishi Bharadwaj-10'A'