I see I made that one too easy.Juven Ignus said:
How about...
A clerk in a butcher's shop is five foot ten. What does he weigh?
Your Favorite Brain Teaser
- Thread starter RedDeadFred
- Start date
Recommended Videos
How about...
A clerk in a butcher's shop is five foot ten. What does he weigh?
I have a few:
What can you put in a barrel to make it lighter?
A plane leaves for Vancouver from Toronto. It crashes over Calgary. Where are the survivors buried?
An Arab sheikh tells his two sons to race their camels to a distant city to see who will inherit his fortune. The one whose camel is slower wins. After wandering aimlessly for days, the brothers ask a wise man for guidance. Upon receiving the advice, they jump on the camels and race to the city as fast as they can.
What did the wise man say to them?
What can you put in a barrel to make it lighter?
A plane leaves for Vancouver from Toronto. It crashes over Calgary. Where are the survivors buried?
An Arab sheikh tells his two sons to race their camels to a distant city to see who will inherit his fortune. The one whose camel is slower wins. After wandering aimlessly for days, the brothers ask a wise man for guidance. Upon receiving the advice, they jump on the camels and race to the city as fast as they can.
What did the wise man say to them?
I should expand a bit: you're not allowed to talk after the hats are placed on your heads, but you can hear what the people behind you say and whether they were right.Juven Ignus said:
Oh, and I'm aware that I'm a terrible person.
A holeBlindMessiah94 said:
Unless you want a lawsuit on your hands, you don't bury survivorsBlindMessiah94 said:
Swap CamelsBlindMessiah94 said:
Where the hell's me tractor?Steeveeo said:
In a group of siblings, there are seven sisters, and each sister has one brother. How many siblings are there in total?
Correct!Altheus_Necron said:
Your last good ping-pong ball fell down into a narrow metal pipe embedded in concrete one foot deep.
How can you get it out undamaged, if all the tools you have are your tennis paddle, your shoe-laces, and your plastic water bottle, which does not fit into the pipe?
What can run but never walks, has a mouth but never talks, has a head but never weeps, and has a bed but never sleeps??
Altheus_Necron said:
Well done, I'm all out of cookies but here's something to tide you over:skystryke said:
Here's one for you computer scientists and logicians; (This is an actual interview question from Google)
You have 1000 bottles of wine, and one of them is poisoned, but you don't know which one.
At your disposal are 10 prisoners who are slated to die today, which you can use to figure out which bottle is poisoned.
The poison is relatively fast-acting, meaning it will kill the prisoner after a little while, but one could take a drink from all 1000 bottles before the poison would take effect.
How do you figure out which bottle is poisoned?
There are two possible answers to this riddle, one is a lot better than the other.
You have 1000 bottles of wine, and one of them is poisoned, but you don't know which one.
At your disposal are 10 prisoners who are slated to die today, which you can use to figure out which bottle is poisoned.
The poison is relatively fast-acting, meaning it will kill the prisoner after a little while, but one could take a drink from all 1000 bottles before the poison would take effect.
How do you figure out which bottle is poisoned?
There are two possible answers to this riddle, one is a lot better than the other.
Well, 2^10 = 1024, so you could just do a binary search. I'm not sure what the better answer is, though.Finnboghi said:
Are people still stumped on mine?
the mathematical answer is simple. divide up the wine, give each prisoner a glass of wine from each of 100 separate bottles, then wait for one of them to die. when one dies, you take his 100 bottles and divide them again among the 9 remaining survivors, giving each 11 bottles (and one of them 12) and wait for one to die again. dividing the 11 (or 12) bottles between the 8 survivors gives 1 or 2 each; if the one that dies has 2 bottles, give one to one of 2 and the one that dies has the poisoned bottle. and you managed to save 6 or 7 prisoners' lives... at least until they are executed. (quicker, but more torturous, no?)Finnboghi said:
OR you can give each one a sample from each bottle, wait the requisite time and see if they die, 10 bottles at a time. It's significantly slower, but has a 1% chance (increasing with every round) of ending early. This is why regular brute force sucks...
the REAL scientific answer is even simpler. run a dropper-sized sample from each of the 1000 bottles (clearly marked of course) through a mass spectrometer, the poisoned wine will be chemically different in a significant way. the prisoners can help you or whatever, then you can let them share the one bottle, if you feel like killing them yourself. (you have access to prisoners, which means you have access to a prison, which grants you access to police officers, which in turn could grant you use of the local crime lab. this assumes the "experiment" takes place in modern times with modern communications and forensic equipment)
the best answer, of course, is to ignore the prisoners completely and sell all 1000 bottles. you don't get any of the wine, but you're 100% guaranteed not to drink the poisoned one... and you can use some of the cash you made selling the wine to settle the lawsuit against you from the family of whoever bought your poisoned bottle and the rest to buy non-poisoned wine directly from a vineyard. Caveat Emptor! (I think I spelled that right, my Latin is terrible)