Here's a brainteaser:

[maninahat]

It doesn't matter if they had white or red balls. Every man who is willing to 'take a step further' is a wise man.

That's what I figured.

 

[nuba km]

It doesn't matter if they had white or red balls. Every man who is willing to 'take a step further' is a wise man.

That's what I figured.

I third that.

 

[maninahat]

So when does he reveal the answer?

 

[Stalk3rchief]

Maybe they just got tired of standing there and waiting for someone to move, so they all did. idfk. I want to know why they all moved at the same time, that's odd...

 

[Anti Nudist Cupcake]

Truth be told, they didn't, they took a leap of faith.

Btw, that was an assassin's creed reverence, when Altair confronts his master and the master asks how he knew he wouldn't kill him.

 

[GRoXERs]

The wise apprentices saw the others looking quizzically at them three times then finally decided this meant they could step forward, since chances were the apprentices would be more likely to look expectantly at the ones with red balls on their heads.

 

[UggBoot]

He didn't say how many balls there were, only that there was at least one red and one white. If there were only were two apprentices and one could see the other had a white ball, then he must have a red ball.

 

[Tsunimo]

So, are we getting the answer or not?
Cause it would be nice if we did...

 

[maninahat]

So there's this wise man which has an unknown number of apprentices. One day he gathers all of them and tells them: "Today I will separate the wise from the foolish." He brings out a bag of red balls and a bag of white balls (their number is also unknown). "Those which are wise will receive a red ball and those which are not will receive a white ball." after which he starts to put the balls on their heads. Catch is every apprentice can see the balls on the others heads but not his own. The master then says: "All of the wise men take a step further!" The apprentices start looking at each other but no one moves. The master repeats: "All of the wise men take a step further!" The apprentices have the same reaction. The same thing happens the third time, yet the fourth time when the master asks the wise men to move they do. And the master congratulates them.

How did the wise men know they had red balls on their heads?

The thread has sort of died out. Will you give us the answer and put us out of our misery? (For the sake of future interest, make sure you put the correct answer in spoiler tags)

 

[Flauros]

Because since the others didnt move, they must be seeing the same thing hes seeing.

 

[x0ny]

They saw their reflection in their master's glasses. So obvious...

 

[Layz92]

There were not morons and took the balls off their heads and had a look. I take liberties with the gaps in facts given. Failing that a budding archer decided to shoot the red balls off on the count of 3.

 

[skips]

Given that this thread has died, would it be possible for you to post the answer? I'm sure that I'm not the only one who is curious.

 

[sycoesis]

they realized this was a stupid way to determin and that it was pointless so stepped forward to show they were wise enough not to be fooled by this

 

[Best of the 3]

Well hey, at least no one was blue balled. *shudders*

 

[Drakane]

To take a step further you are all moving in the same direction, no seperation. TO move you can go in different directions allowing seperation?

 

[Halceon]

So there's this wise man which has an unknown number of apprentices. One day he gathers all of them and tells them: "Today I will separate the wise from the foolish." He brings out a bag of red balls and a bag of white balls (their number is also unknown). "Those which are wise will receive a red ball and those which are not will receive a white ball." after which he starts to put the balls on their heads. Catch is every apprentice can see the balls on the others heads but not his own. The master then says: "All of the wise men take a step further!" The apprentices start looking at each other but no one moves. The master repeats: "All of the wise men take a step further!" The apprentices have the same reaction. The same thing happens the third time, yet the fourth time when the master asks the wise men to move they do. And the master congratulates them.

How did the wise men know they had red balls on their heads?

They took the balls and looked at them. A wise man isn't wise because he knows things. A wise man is wise because he knows how to find things out.

Now COME HERE AND GIVE US THE RIGHT ANSWER!

 

[James93672]

The answer is in the number of times he asked them.

The apprentices know that there is at least one wise person and at least one unwise person in their crowd. But they don't know if they themselves are wise or not at first.

If the master had only given one of the apprentices a red ball, he would immediately seen that no one else had one and would have stepped forward the first time the master called.

If the mastr had given two of them red balls, they would both have seen one other apprentice with a red ball. So they still wouldn't know if they were wise or not.
The first time the master would call, they would both notice that the other wise apprentice didn't move, which could only mean that the other apprentice could also see a red ball. Therefore, both apprentices would know that they were wise and would step forward the second time the master asked.

Now imagine there are 4 apprentices with a red ball on their head:
the master asks a first time for the wise to step forward. The wise ones see 3 other apprentices with a red ball and so they don't step forward because they don't yet know if they are wise or not.
The second time the same thing happens, and the third time as well.
But the fourth time the master asks the wise to step forward, they realise that if there had only been 3 wise apprentices, they would all havce been sure of it the third time the master asked them to step forward, so they would know that there were four wise apprentices, and therefore that they were wise.

There, sorry for the wall of text but it is a bit complicated to explain :/

 

[Amethyst Wind]

There are 3 people with red balls on their heads.

The first time one looks at one of the others with a red ball, expecting them to move..

The second time they look at the last red ball bearer, also expecting them to move.

The third time they look at where the white ball bearers are looking and see they are looking back at them, expecting them to move.

The fourth time they move because they know they are expected to.