The idea for Roshambo as a religion was first put forth by Our Founder Lenny Augustine (lenny@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu). The philosophy and religion quickly took form and has continued to evolve since.
The elements are:
And the Lord did look down upon the earth and saw the land barren and without form. And he did create from the clay of the earth the rock in His image. And he did set upon the land a multitude of rocks that they should cover the landscape, and all was good. But the Lord grew tired of the lifeless landscape and so He set upon the land the living tree, that paper should be fashioned from, to cover the rock, and all was good. But once again, the Lord grew uncomfortable with His creations; there was an imbalance, with all that is paper being above all that is rock, and the Lord could not accept that any form should be above all, accept for He Himself. And the Lord did set upon the land, in the almighty scissors, crafted by man and machine, so that the scissor might cut the paper, and show that no one shall be above all others. And the mighty rock, the original of the Lord's creations, did smash the scissors here and there, to keep the Almighty's balance.
As an example, on a recent pilgrimage to Vegas a spontaneous roshambo erupted between a complete stranger, myself and one of my poker buddies. The original challenge began with my buddy Rafe and the mystery woman, but I said I would roshambo her as well, and that I would "kick her butt" or words to that effect. Well, I defeated her, but she beat Rafe. Clearly, then, Rafe also beat me. But, my challenge was not with Rafe and I did not consider this to be a defeat since I was not roshamboing him. I then went on to Schneid the mystery woman 5-0 in roshambos. Well, all was fine and dandy except that there was a betting line on roshambo differential for the trip, and Rafe and I were dueling it out. Rafe insisted he was a wash, and that I should only pick up 4 wins differential since I lost to him. I insisted I never played against. How to settle the dispute? Roshambo for it, of course. Now, if I won, I go up 6 on the differential and he goes to minus 2. If he wins, he goes to +1, and I go to +3. That's really three roshambos riding on one and a differential of 6 riding on one roshambo. Of course, being the roshambo king, I defeated Rafe and went up big time on the list.
"roshambo" can be used to settle disputes among friends, decide on who pays bills, haggle for automobiles or even settle court cases. I can see it now:
OJ Simpson: Your honor, what's say we roshambo for the verdict. I win, I walk. I lose, life in prison. It'll save the taxpayers lots of money.
Judge Ito: Sure, but I'm going rock.
OJ: Fine.One...two..three... The Honorable Lance "rock" Ito goes rock. OJ goes knife. Rock crushes knife. OJ goes to prison. Spends rest of life crushing rocks. Poetic justice, no?
The Disciples of Roshambo mailing list exists to discuss Roshambo. You can send email to the Disciples at rock@cs.stanford.edu. You may request addition to the list by sending email to rock-request@cs.stanford.edu.
Additionally, the Usenet Newsgroup alt.religion.roshambo is dedicated to discussions relating to Roshambo.
Thank you for your support.
The WWW Roshambot can be found at
http://chappie.stanford.edu/cgi-bin/roshambotYou can read more about the WWW Roshambot at
http://chappie.stanford.edu/~perry/roshambo/index.html
Email was sent to Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich and President Bill Clinton notifying them of this service and suggesting that they could solve all manners of disputes with it, including the budget stalemate (line by line or wholesale), welfare reform, etc.
This program brings to the web the vision of Section 5 and allows roshambo to be played over great distances between parties that can not play against one another directly.
The WWW Dispute Arbiter can be found at
http://chappie.stanford.edu/cgi-restricted/arbiterHowever, it is only available to registered users. You can read more about the WWW Dispute Arbiter at
http://chappie.stanford.edu/~perry/roshambo/restricted.html#arbiter
This FAQ maintained by Perry Friedman (friedman@cs.stanford.edu).