Zendo, play by forum

[Simon]

a koan has the buddha nature if and only if the letters in it go from left to right; in Alphabetic order

BROWNROWNROWN (white) is a counterexample. This was added to my IRC post above while you were writing.

YUTS - black
ZOON - black
LIGED - black
FEUTI - black
LIKELIKE - black
LIKELIKELIKE - black

-- Simon

[mobius]

C
D
E
Q
LOOK
LOOO
VFGFHF

[Simon]

C, D, E, Q: all white
LOOK: black
LOOO: white
VFGFHF: black

And from IRC:
WUUT - black
TUUW - white

-- Simon

[mobius]

AB
ABAB
ABABA
AABBAA

ABBCCCDDDD
BAAAB
BAB
BABA

[Proxima]

Bouncing on mobius' idea (which may be going completely in the wrong direction) I shall guess:

A koan has the buddha-nature if its first letter is the same as or alphabetically earlier than each of its other letters.

[Simon]

AB - white
ABAB - black
ABABA - black
AABBAA - black

ABBCCCDDDD - white
BAAAB - black
BAB - black
BABA - black

A koan has the buddha-nature if its first letter is the same as or alphabetically earlier than each of its other letters.

This is not correct. There is one existing disproving koan: BROWNBROWN, marked black, which would be white according to this guess.

-- Simon

[Minim]

Let's go for some more common words rather than freaky letter codes.

TEA
COFFEE
SUGAR
WINE
BEER
CHARCOAL
IGLOO

[Simon]

TEA - black
COFFEE - white
SUGAR - black
WINE - black
BEER - white
CHARCOAL - black
IGLOO - black

Tea and charcoal is about the only thing that colored appropriately here. <_<

-- Simon

[Proxima]

Ok then, I guess that a koan has the buddha-nature if its first letter is alphabetically earlier than each of its other letters. 

[Simon]

a koan has the buddha-nature if its first letter is alphabetically earlier than each of its other letters. 

You are enlightened. Well done!

You may host a next round immediately.

-- Simon

[mobius]

Ok then, I guess that a koan has the buddha-nature if its first letter is alphabetically earlier than each of its other letters. 

DOH! I actually thought of this but for some reason immediately thought; "no, that can't be it" 

good job, and good rule. Simple yet stumped everyone for a while

[Proxima]

Okay 

In this round, BUDDHA has the buddha-nature
and NATURE does not have the buddha-nature.

[Simon]

BUDDHANATURE
NATURALSCIENCES
NUT
BUD
BUDWEISER
RHAPSODY
DUB

-- Simon

[Ramon]

will a BUDDHIST have the Budhda-Nature?

[NaOH]

HCL