Np-hard Memes

Posts tagged with Np-hard

I'll Pick The Path With The Most People

I'll Pick The Path With The Most People
The meme brilliantly combines two classic computer science nightmares: the Traveling Salesman Problem and the Trolley Problem. In one, you're trying to find the optimal path through a complex graph (a famously NP-hard problem that makes algorithms cry). In the other, you're deciding which track to send a runaway trolley down, usually with moral implications about who gets squished. The joke is that instead of optimizing for the shortest path or making a moral choice, our protagonist is choosing the path with the most people to run over. It's basically what happens when your pathfinding algorithm has a vendetta against humanity. Dijkstra would be horrified... or impressed, depending on his mood that day.

Can You Find The Optimal Route For The Trolley?

Can You Find The Optimal Route For The Trolley?
The "Travelling Salesman Trolley Problem" brilliantly combines two infamous nightmares: an ethical dilemma and an NP-hard algorithm. While philosophers debate whether to sacrifice one person to save five, computer scientists are still trying to find the optimal route through this graph without having an existential crisis. The joke here is that finding the perfect path is mathematically impossible to solve efficiently—much like trying to explain to your product manager why that "simple feature" will take three months to implement. Just remember: whether you choose the greedy algorithm or dynamic programming approach, someone's deadline is definitely getting run over.