[hestermofet]

I just love brain teasers. A coworker of mine loves them too, so every shift, we used to get them off the Internet, until the bastards at head office blocked the site we used. I'm playing a DS game right now called Professor Layton and the Curious Village which is nothing but brain teasers (tied in with a very imaginative story, believe it or not), and I'm getting my rocks off through that. What're your favourite brain teasers?


Here's an easy one to get you started from Professor Layton.

You go to a small stall at the local bazaar, and approach the merchant. He tells you, "I'm selling this camera and case set for $310. I can sell you the case alone for $300 less than the camera. I can sell you the camera for the price of the set minus the cost of the case." You decide to put off the purchase of the camera, and decide to get the case right now. You hand the merchant a $100 bill. How much change should you get back?


Please post your answers in spoiler tags, to give others a chance to try it out.

edit: could a mod move this to Quickies?

This post has been edited by hestermofet: 06 June 2008 - 05:02 PM

[shakey_snake]

[color=#000000;background:#000000' onmouseover="this.style.color='#ffffff';" onmouseout="this.style.color=this.style.color='#000000']$95 in change.
case = $5;
camera = $305

Checks:
"I can sell you the case alone for $300 less than the camera."
camera - 300 = case
305-300 = 5

"I can sell you the camera for the price of the set minus the cost of the case."
set - case = camera
310 - 5 = 305
[/color]

This post has been edited by shakey_snake: 06 June 2008 - 05:15 PM

[hestermofet]

Correct.


A boy and his older sister are sitting around the dinner table when the sister realizes, "Hey if you give me two of your years, I'll be twice as old as you!" The boy responds, "If I give you another year on top of that, you'll be three times as old as me!". How old are they?

This post has been edited by hestermofet: 06 June 2008 - 05:14 PM

[shakey_snake]

[color=#000000;background:#000000' onmouseover="this.style.color='#ffffff';" onmouseout="this.style.color=this.style.color='#000000']they are both 6.

she maybe only a few days older than him (adopted?), or only a few hours or minutes (twins?).
but definitely less than a year.
[/color]

This post has been edited by shakey_snake: 06 June 2008 - 05:24 PM

[hestermofet]

Correct! :)

You have ten lit candles in the dining room. You come back an hour later, and an open window extinguished two of them. You return yet another hour later, and two more have gone out. You get tired of your candles blowing out, so you close the window. When you come back in the morning, how many candles should you have remaining?

[Chica]

Aren't the first two just... algebra problems?

For the candle teaser...
[color=#000000;background:#000000' onmouseover="this.style.color='#ffffff';" onmouseout="this.style.color=this.style.color='#000000']Candles? Still ten, unless someone stole some.[/color]

I used to go to braingle.com for my brain teasers. They had some fun logic problems too. (Figure out who sat where, and what soup, salad, and sandwich each one ate... stuff like that)

Here's a brain teaser for you: How does this thread have 0 views, but 5 comments? O_o

This post has been edited by Chica: 06 June 2008 - 06:13 PM

[hestermofet]

Bzzzt! Wrong! :( You can assume no one stole any candles, and no more candles are blown out.

Yeah, Braingle was the site my coworker and I went to.


Here's another. It's also math-based, like the first two.

There are twenty people on a sinking ship. The ship is in shark-infested waters, and will go down in 20 minutes. Luckily, there's a life raft, and a nearby island. If the life raft can carry 5 people, and the roundtrip to the island takes 9 minutes, how many poor souls will NOT be saved?

This post has been edited by hestermofet: 06 June 2008 - 06:22 PM

[shakey_snake]

hestermofet, on Jun 6 2008, 02:13 PM, said:

Bzzzt! Wrong! :( You can assume no one stole any candles, and no more candles are blown out.

[color=#000000;background:#000000' onmouseover="this.style.color='#ffffff';" onmouseout="this.style.color=this.style.color='#000000']You'd have 4 candles and 6 lumps of wax.[/color]

Quote

There are twenty people on a sinking ship. The ship is in shark-infested waters, and will go down in 20 minutes. Luckily, there's a life raft, and a nearby island. If the life raft can carry 5 people, and the roundtrip to the island takes 9 minutes, how many poor souls will NOT be saved?

[color=#000000;background:#000000' onmouseover="this.style.color='#ffffff';" onmouseout="this.style.color=this.style.color='#000000']Assuming complete efficiency,
5 people won't make it.

10 will be on the island,
5 will be 2 minutes on their way to the island.[/color]

This post has been edited by shakey_snake: 06 June 2008 - 06:56 PM

[feroxis]

hestermofet, on Jun 6 2008, 01:13 PM, said:

There are twenty people on a sinking ship. The ship is in shark-infested waters, and will go down in 20 minutes. Luckily, there's a life raft, and a nearby island. If the life raft can carry 5 people, and the roundtrip to the island takes 9 minutes, how many poor souls will NOT be saved?

[color=#000000;background:#000000' onmouseover="this.style.color='#ffffff';" onmouseout="this.style.color=this.style.color='#000000']7 won't make it. 5 are "saved" the first trip, but one has to row the boat back to the ship so only 4 are saved on the last two trips.[/color]

[techs]

How big are the candles?

Or in other words, [color=#000000;background:#000000' onmouseover="this.style.color='#ffffff';" onmouseout="this.style.color=this.style.color='#000000']0, unless the candles are exceptionally large and slow-burning[/color]

Edit: [color=#000000;background:#000000' onmouseover="this.style.color='#ffffff';" onmouseout="this.style.color=this.style.color='#000000']or, if you want to count like shakey, and distinguish between "candle" and "lit candle", then 4 unless the candles are exceptionally large and slow burning.[/color]

This post has been edited by techsupp0rt: 06 June 2008 - 07:16 PM

[Chica]

Not enough info to answer the candle question properly, unless it's a trick question of some sort.

[hestermofet]

Shakey got the candle question and Feroxis got the ship question. Good job guys, as both have a trick to them (or at least, require unconventional thinking). In the candle problem [color=#000000;background:#000000' onmouseover="this.style.color='#ffffff';" onmouseout="this.style.color=this.style.color='#000000']6 of the candles will no longer be there as they will have burned down[/color], and in the sinking ship problem, you have to realize [color=#000000;background:#000000' onmouseover="this.style.color='#ffffff';" onmouseout="this.style.color=this.style.color='#000000']that you need someone on the life raft to row it back to the ship[/color].

This post has been edited by hestermofet: 06 June 2008 - 08:45 PM

[Chica]

What candles don't last more than one whole night? O_o

<edit> Sorry, I'm being really rude. I'm cranky today :( </edit>

This post has been edited by Chica: 06 June 2008 - 09:12 PM

[techs]

[color=#000000;background:#000000' onmouseover="this.style.color='#ffffff';" onmouseout="this.style.color=this.style.color='#000000']Tealights.[/color]

[Chica]

:lol:

[Xerxes]

What gets bigger the more you take away from it?

[Magilla]

[color=#000000;background:#000000' onmouseover="this.style.color='#ffffff';" onmouseout="this.style.color=this.style.color='#000000']A hole[/color]

[Xerxes]

Right. It's kind of an easy riddle, but I like it as a metaphor of psychological implications...



Otherwise, I'm more of an unanswerable zen koan rather than a brain teaser guy :-I

This post has been edited by Xerxes: 07 June 2008 - 08:54 AM

[Sandman2012]

I got this riddle from a Neil Gaiman story:

When there is fire in me then I am still cold; when I own your true love's face then you will not see me; to all things I give no more than I am given; in time I may have all things and yet I may keep nothing.

[hestermofet]

Chica, on Jun 6 2008, 05:11 PM, said:

What candles don't last more than one whole night? O_o

I don't know, I don't really use candles for more than 30 minutes at a time (i.e., when the power goes out).

Magilla, on Jun 7 2008, 04:32 AM, said:

[color=#000000;background:#000000' onmouseover="this.style.color='#ffffff';" onmouseout="this.style.color=this.style.color='#000000']A hole[/color]

Don't call me that! :angry: