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Comment by gwern | Hacker News Reader

Arguably, it doesn't really make a difference, because every possible 800-page sequence exists as a pair of 400-page books from the original Library, and so on and so forth. The 800-page, 1200-page, 1600-page and every greater length Library is as well-defined, complete, and vacuous as the original 400-page version.

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Hi, there's an infinite number of coach drivers outside. They say they booked ahead?

Please let them all know, individually, to get in the queue. I'll start processing them once you're done.

no drivers are currently being processed. no drivers have been processed for more than 2000 days. the queue is full. any additional drivers are being sent to compressed storage until that storage is full too. for more details refer to service model by adrian tchaikovsky. ;-)

Borges should have just stopped with a kids ABC book then!

Does the library contain duplicates? Otherwise an 800 page book that is just the same 400 page book concatenated to itself would not be found.

Half the library would just be the other half written backwards.

Who said you can't just stipulate having the same book twice or use self-reference?

But, since there is a finite number of 400 page books, there are only so many permutations before you run out of books.

The most trivial example, you cant make an 800 page concatenation of two identical books because the 400 page library doesn't contain duplicates.

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