The correct answer to the classic trick question "Have you stopped
beating your wife yet?". Assuming that you have no wife or you have
never beaten your wife, the answer "yes" is wrong because it implies
that you used to beat your wife and then stopped, but "no" is worse
because it suggests that you have one and are still beating her.
According to various Discordians and Douglas Hofstadter the correct
answer is usually "mu", a Japanese word alleged to mean "Your
question cannot be answered because it depends on incorrect
assumptions". Hackers tend to be sensitive to logical inadequacies in
language, and many have adopted this suggestion with enthusiasm. The
word `mu' is actually from Chinese, meaning `nothing'; it is used in
mainstream Japanese in that sense. In Chinese it can also mean "have
not" (as in "I have not done it"), or "lack of", which may or may not
be a definite, complete 'nothing'). Native speakers of Japanese do
not recognize the Discordian question-denying use, which almost
certainly derives from overgeneralization of the answer in the
following well-known Rinzai Zen {koan}:
A monk asked Joshu, "Does a dog have the Buddha nature?" Joshu
retorted, "Mu!"
See also {has the X nature}, Some AI Koans, and Douglas Hofstadter's
Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid (pointer in the
Bibliography in Appendix C.
[glossary]
[Reference(s) to this entry by made by: {has the X nature}]