Editing Nim (section)

==History==
Variants of nim have been played since ancient times.<ref>
{{citation
 | last = Jorgensen | first = Anker Helms
 | doi = 10.1109/MAHC.2009.41
 | issue = 3
 | journal = IEEE Annals of the History of Computing
 | mr = 2767447
 | quote = The two-person mathematical game nim, which many believe originated in China, is probably one of the oldest games in the world.
 | pages = 44–53
 | title = Context and driving forces in the development of the early computer game Nimbi
 | url = http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/ieee_annals_of_the_history_of_computing/v031/31.3.jorgensen.html
 | volume = 31
 | year = 2009| s2cid = 2833693
| url-access = subscription
 }}</ref> The game is said to have originated in [[China]]—it closely resembles the Chinese game of {{Transliteration|zh|jiǎn-shízǐ}} ({{lang|zh|捡石子}}), or "picking stones"<ref>
{{citation
 | last = Yaglom | first = I. M. | author-link = Isaak Yaglom
 | editor-last = Tabachnikov | editor-first = Serge |editor-link=Sergei Tabachnikov
 | contribution = Two games with matchsticks
 | isbn = 9780821821718
 | pages = 1–8
 | publisher = [[American Mathematical Society]]
 | series = Mathematical world
 | title = Kvant Selecta: Combinatorics, I, Volume 1
 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=yID37VIW-t8C&pg=PA1
 | volume = 17
 | year = 2001
}}</ref>—but the origin is uncertain; the earliest European references to nim are from the beginning of the 16th century. Its current name was coined by [[Charles L. Bouton]] of [[Harvard University]], who also developed the complete theory of the game in 1901,<ref>
{{citation
 | last = Bouton | first = C. L. | author-link = Charles L. Bouton
 | doi = 10.2307/1967631
 | issue = 14
 | journal = [[Annals of Mathematics]]
 | pages = 35–39
 | title = Nim, ''a game with a complete mathematical theory''
 | volume = 3
 | year = 1901–1902| jstor = 1967631
}}</ref> but the origins of the name were never fully explained. The ''[[Oxford English Dictionary]]'' derives the name from the German verb {{lang|de|[[wikt:nimm|nimm]]}}, meaning "take".

At the [[1939 New York World's Fair]], [[Westinghouse Electric (1886)|Westinghouse]] displayed a machine, the [[Nimatron]], that played nim.<ref>{{cite book|last=Flesch|first=Rudolf|title=The Art of Clear Thinking|year=1951|publisher=Harper and Brothers Publishers|location=New York|page=3}}</ref> From May&nbsp;11 to October&nbsp;27, 1940, only a few people were able to beat the machine in that six-month period; if they did, they were presented with a coin that said "Nim Champ".<ref>{{Cite web |last=Kellem |first=Betsy |date=2022-03-01 |title=The Nimatron |url=https://daily.jstor.org/the-nimatron/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230628121301/https://daily.jstor.org/the-nimatron/ |archive-date=2023-06-28 |access-date=2023-06-28 |website=JSTOR Daily}}</ref> It was also one of the first-ever electronic computerized games. [[Ferranti]] built a [[Nimrod (computer)|nim-playing computer]] which was displayed at the [[Festival of Britain]] in 1951. In 1952, Herbert Koppel, Eugene Grant and Howard Baller, engineers from the W. L. Maxson Corporation, developed a machine weighing {{convert|50|lbs|kg|order=flip}} which played nim against a human opponent and regularly won.<ref>{{Cite news |url=http://www.newyorker.com/archive/1952/08/02/1952_08_02_018_TNY_CARDS_000236053 |title=The Talk of the Town – It |first1=Eugene F. |last1=Grant |first2=Rex |last2=Lardner |date=August 2, 1952 |newspaper=[[The New Yorker]]}}</ref> A nim playing machine has been described made from [[tinkertoy]]s.<ref>{{cite web|url = http://harveycohen.net/papers/80-Nim_Playing_Machine.pdf|title=How to Construct NIM Playing Machine | first=Harvey A. | last=Cohen}}</ref>

The game of nim was the subject of [[Martin Gardner]]'s February 1958 [[Mathematical Games column]] in ''[[Scientific American]]''. A version of nim is played—and has symbolic importance—in the [[French New Wave]] film ''[[Last Year at Marienbad]]'' (1961).<ref>
{{citation
 | last = Morrissette | first = Bruce
 | doi = 10.2307/2929672
 | journal = Yale French Studies
 | pages = 159–167
 | title = Games and game structures in Robbe-Grillet
 | issue = 41
 | year = 1968| jstor = 2929672
}}. Morrissette writes that [[Alain Robbe-Grillet]], one of the screenwriters for the film, "thought he had invented" the game.</ref>