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rescue operation - where is your partner?
your partners space ship has crashed on an unihabtiated planet... only the radio transmitter and his compass were still operation... he asked you to rescue him... he tells you how to find him by that following story: 1. he went one unit into the south 2. then he went one unit to the west 3. then he went one ...
There is a painting tool that can paint a circle area of $1$ unit radius. What is the shortest paint track for painting at least a $100*100$ units rectangle area on wall? How much did the painting tool moved in total? ***** Rules: - Tool must touch wall only *once*. (It says that painting should be continues a...
There is a painting brush tool that can paint a circle area of $1$ unit radius. What is the shortest paint track for painting at least a $100*100$ units rectangle area on wall? How much did the brush moved in total? ***** Rules: - Brush must touch wall only *once*. (It says that painting should be continues an...
It seems that mostly either 26 or 32 equal-size polygons are used to cover a spherical soccer ball. What other configurations are possible?
How many equal-sized polygons can be used to cover a soccer ball?
Most of the possible solutions would be found in the collection of Platonic or Archimedean solids. The platonic fit the description of same size faces: http://www.korthalsaltes.com/cuadros.php?type=p In that case the options are 4 6 8 12 or 20. (note: some of them are highly unenjoyable to play with). The A...
There is a painting brush tool that can paint a circle area of $1$ unit radius. What is the shortest paint track for painting at least a $100*100$ units rectangle area on wall? How much did the brush moved in total? ***** Rules: - Brush must touch wall only *once*. (It says that painting should be continues an...
There are an infinite number of ways to cover a soccer ball, if you're allowed to use "biangles", polygons with two sides and two vertices. Draw a line from the ball's north pole to its south pole. Repeat this process any number of times. Now you have a "beach ball" pattern, with however many slices you desire, all of ...
Sorry, but there's a flaw in the riddle's question that is badly waved away with: >"Before you email me to argue or question: This solution is correct. My explanation may not be the clearest, and it's very difficult to wrap your head around (at least, it was for me), but the facts of it are accurate. I've talked ...
Let's involve some maths in this question. I'll make some assumptions in order to simplify. Let's say humans have a perfect spheric head, with a surface of S=4*pi*r^2 and a radius of 20 cm (which is way bigger than the actual human head radius. This gives a surface of roughly 0.5 square metres. Let's say it is full ...
Let's involve some maths in this question. I'll make some assumptions in order to simplify. Let's say humans have a perfect spheric head, with a surface of $S=4*pi*r^2$ and a radius of $20 cm$ (which is way bigger than the actual human head radius. This gives a surface of roughly $0.5$ square metres. Let's say it is...
> How can you assure you get in the shortest amount of time? Unfortunately, if you know nothing about the design of the maze, then there is no optimal strategy. For example, it would be easy to design a maze that quickly splits off into two paths - one that ends almost immediately, and one that winds around to use u...
A AA BA ABAA AAABBA CABBAA ACAABBBA AAACBACBAA CAACABAAACABBA ... ... ... It's an altered version of a sequence you all know! Remember, the answer should be in the above format, +1 if you state the sequence in the original format! BONUS: Will D ever appear, why, or why not?
What does this encoded message mean?
A sequence goes as follows: A AA BA ABAA AAABBA CABBAA ACAABBBA AAACBACBAA CAACABAAACABBA ... It's an altered version of a sequence you all know! The answer should be in the above format. Additionally, will D ever appear?
Here's a puzzle I heard some time ago, but I never heard the asker's solution. It took me ages to think up a satisfactory solution, but I'm wondering if there are any others you can think of? 100 Marbles Puzzle: > A boy has two bags with marbles in. He has exactly twice as many marbles in one bag as in the other ...
So, the triangles are the same size, they are equilateral triangles. Can you use an odd number of these, to create a rectangle? If so how many, if possible post an image of your answer! Answer with the least amount of triangles gets Best Answer
Can you make a Square from an Odd Number of Triangles?
This is a supplemental to Kendall's answer that proves its correctness: Because there are four bolts each with two possible positions, there are $2^4=16$ states. You might think we'd want to categorize the states are by the number of bolts that are currently blocking one of the doors, but that won't really help us. ...
Can you make a Rectangle from an Odd Number of Triangles?
My friend suggested another interesting idea to answer this question. Contradict himself means to say something illogical, independently of the perception of the reality. For example, "sky is not blue" would not be contradiction, may be our Knave is colorblind, or just crazy. But must leave here a criteria for what ...
The sundial keeps time with the fewest number of moving parts. Which timepiece has the most moving parts?
The universe? I keeps time as it contains all other known timepieces and it kind of defines what time is.
Sherlock had been invited to lunch by a rich man in London. He went to the man's house and found that the lunch was actually a huge party and there were a lot of people around. *Dreadful*, he thought. *I hate large gatherings.* "I didn't know there would be so many... guests," he told the host. "Oh, these ...
You die and ascend to heaven, there is a knight (truth-teller), a knave (pure liar) and a joker (random) sitting on a cloud - they all look the same. In order to gain entry you must determine their identities. You have 3 yes/no questions (each directed to only one of them). They will only respond to questions speaking ...
This is so called The Hardest Logic Puzzle Ever. [Wikipedia][1] has a thorough description of it and its solutions, including different versions of formulations of how the joker functions (which was not defined in the OP's question). I can site the very basics here: Formulation: > Three gods A, B, and C are ca...
A floating ship contains one stone. The captain sees the stray stone and throws it into the water. What result will this action have on the water level? Will it increase or decrease?
What is the minimum number of stamp touches for painting a $100*100$ rectangle if you have one circular stamp tool that paints a circular area of $1$ unit radius in every touch? This question is very similar to [Paint the rectangle with least movement][1]. But this time there is no brush tool for painting. [1]:...
What is the minimum number of touches for painting at least a $100*100$ rectangle if you have one circular stamp tool that paints a circular area of $1$ unit radius in every touch? This question is very similar to [Paint the rectangle with least movement][1]. But this time there is no brush tool for painting. [...
This is so called The Hardest Logic Puzzle Ever. [Wikipedia][1] has a thorough description of it and its solutions, including different versions of formulations of how the joker functions (which was not defined in the OP's question). I can cite the very basics here: Formulation: > Three gods A, B, and C are ca...
You are on a trail in a desert. You already drank all your water, and are 2 miles from the next well. There is a crossroad in the trail. One path leads directly to the fountain, and one leads out into the middle of nowhere. At the crossroad, there is an Indian. He is from one of two tribes - one tribe *always* te...
Pretty vanilla knights and knaves riddle. You should ask > "If I asked you which road leads to the fountain, which would you say?" Assume **A** is the correct road, and **B** is the wrong road. The truth-teller would normally answer **A** if you asked which road is safe, so when you ask which road he'd say if ...
"If I asked the representative from the other tribe, "Which road leads to the fountain?", which would HE say?" Assume A is the correct road, and B is the wrong road. The truth-teller would normally answer A if asked about the road directly, but would know the liar would say 'B' as his response for the fountain ro...
The game _is_ possible. I have completed it. As you have guessed, the aim of the game is to assemble each dot with the 2 matching rings. Hint 1 >! Sorry, I cannot explain exaclty how the pieces moves. I haven't figures everything out. But some general patterns were enough to solve it. Don't loose your time w...
I got a 3D wooden puzzle in which you are supposed to rebuild. I took pictures of the 6 pieces: ![Piece#1][1] ![Piece#2][2] ![Piece#3][3] ![Piece#4][4] ![Piece#5][5] ![Piece#6][6] I found this image on the Internet. I believe it's the solved version: ![Solution][7] How do you solve it? Has anybody here...
I got a 3D wooden puzzle in which you are supposed to rebuild. I took pictures of the 6 pieces (click images to enlarge): [![Piece#1][1]][1a] [![Piece#2][2]][2a] [![Piece#3][3]][3a] [![Piece#4][4]][4a] [![Piece#5][5]][5a] [![Piece#6][6]][6a] I found this image on the Internet. I believe it's the solved versi...
The game _is_ possible. I have completed it. As you have guessed, the aim of the game is to assemble each dot with the 2 matching rings. Hint 1 >! Sorry, I cannot explain exactly how the pieces moves. I haven't figures everything out. But some general patterns were enough to solve it. Don't loose your time w...
You are in a room with a barrier in the middle. This is not a physical barrier; it is a dividing line of 2 mirror images. When you look across the room, it appears to be a mirror because you see a mirror image of yourself and other objects in the room, but the mirror is not made of any substance. It is simply a point w...
You are in a room with a barrier in the middle. This is not a physical barrier; it is a dividing line of 2 mirror images. When you look across the room, it appears to be a mirror because you see a mirror image of yourself and other objects in the room, but the mirror is not made of any substance. It is simply a point w...
Attempt #1 Yes, a liquid or gas. It would collide with, (and pass through) it's mirror image. Attempt #2 Light. It would that count?
You are in a room with a barrier in the middle. This is not a physical barrier; it is a dividing line of 2 mirror images. When you look across the room, it appears to be a mirror because you see a mirror image of yourself and other objects in the room, but the mirror is not made of any substance. It is simply a point w...
This is taken from a riddle book: Val, Lynn and Chris are related to each other, but no incestuously. 1. Among the three are Val's father, Lynn's only daughter, and Chris' sibling. 2. Chris' sibling is neither Val's father nor Lynn's daughter. Which one is a different sex?
You are in a room with a barrier in the middle. This is not a physical barrier; it is a dividing line of 2 mirror images. When you look across the room, it appears to be a mirror because you see a mirror image of yourself and other objects in the room, but the mirror is not made of any substance. It is simply a point w...
Mama snake wants to knit a blanket for little baby snake... She is not a dissipater and wants to make the **blanket of a minimal size** (area)... on the other hand her baby snake is a **quite lively baby** and the baby always twists and stretches and turns around while sleeping... if the baby changes positio...
Mama snake wants to knit a blanket for little baby snake... She is not a dissipater and wants to make the **blanket of a minimal size** (area)... on the other hand her baby snake is a **quite lively baby** and the baby always twists and stretches and turns around while sleeping... if the baby changes positio...
Mama snake wants to knit a blanket for little baby snake... She is not a dissipater and wants to make the **blanket of a minimal size** (area)... on the other hand her baby snake is a **quite lively baby** and the baby always twists and stretches and turns around while sleeping... if the baby changes positio...
Mama snake wants to knit a blanket for little baby snake... She is not a dissipater and wants to make the **blanket of a minimal size** (area)... on the other hand her baby snake is a **quite lively baby** and the baby always twists and stretches and turns around while sleeping... if the baby changes positio...
Mama snake wants to knit a blanket for little baby snake... She is not a dissipater and wants to make the **blanket of a minimal size** (area)... on the other hand her baby snake is a **quite lively baby** and the baby always twists and stretches and turns around while sleeping... if the baby changes positio...
Mama snake wants to knit a blanket for little baby snake. She is not a dissipater and wants to make the **blanket of a minimal size** (area). BUt her baby snake is quite a **lively baby** and it always twists and stretches and turns around while sleeping. Iif the baby changes position or from, mama takes the blan...
Mama snake wants to knit a blanket for little baby snake. She is not a dissipater and wants to make the **blanket of a minimal size** (area). But her baby snake is quite a **lively baby** and it always twists and stretches and turns around while sleeping. If the baby changes position or from, mama takes the blank...
Mama snake wants to knit a blanket for little baby snake. She is not a dissipater and wants to make the **blanket of a minimal size** (area). But her baby snake is quite a **lively baby** and it always twists and stretches and turns around while sleeping. If the baby changes position or from, mama takes the blank...
Mama snake wants to knit a blanket for little baby snake. She is not a dissipater and wants to make the **blanket of a minimal size** (area). But her baby snake is quite a **lively baby** and it always twists and stretches and turns around while sleeping. If the baby changes position or from, mama takes the blank...
Is it "you against all odds"? 1,3,5,7,9 - all odd numbers U = you
What about a rectangular blanket that is 1 x circumference of baby snake? This rectangular blanket could be wrapped around the baby snake (think tube sock) and stretch and fold in any direction with him. The big bonus here is that mama snake doesn't have to tirelessly keep replacing the blanket, the blanket will ...
What 'T_RN' means?
Can anyone tell me what this secret message is? "EVARELTO" Try finding the secret message represented by these letters. I'm sure this will burn your brains.
"EVARELTO" - What does this mean?
DDDWESTDDD - Find this out?
well i'm not sure if i really have a valid answer, but so least blanket i could think of is shape a little weird... ![enter image description here][1] you can put into that blanket - the streched snake, - the 90°L-baby snake, - the U-Shaped baby snake, - a snake shaped like a [___] (dunno how to cal...
A man works at an aquarium. Every day, he has to spend way too much time telling people to stop tapping on the glass at the shark tank. Finally, he gets fed up with it and comes up with a solution. Thankfully, the solution works perfectly, because the next day, nobody tapped on the glass. At the end of his shift, ...
A man was murdered in his office bathroom. Detective Troby found a paper with alphabets written as below from the pocket of the dead man's corpse. ____________________________ | | | abcdefghijkmnopqrstuvwxyz | | | ----------------------...
One day, I was waiting to get on the subway. I was eating the apple I always have for breakfast, and I decided to sit next to a homeless man on the bench. We saw a rather... rotund man walk by us, to which the hobo muttered, "Pig." I didn't give it a second thought, except how rude the comment was. Another man wal...
What about half of a square with a diagonal of 1, cut along the diagonal? For example: \ / \ / \/ The area of this is 1/4, and I think all shapes of snakes would fit in it.
Attempt #1 Yes, a liquid or gas. It would collide with, (and pass through) it's mirror image. Attempt #2 Light. It would that count? Attempt #3 Another mirror, it will create infinite energy back and forth causing the mirrors to break, the walk by.
I just came up across this question in the mathematics stack exchange site and found it quite interesting: 100 autonomous robotic vehicles enter a warehouse in arbitrary order to park. Inside the warehouse, there are 100 sequential parking spaces enumerated from 1 to 100. Each vehicle has an assigned number where it w...
I have another thought. What if you started with a unit square blanket and took away the unit circle from the middle, like this: ![circle in a square][1] If you then took one quarter of that, you'd have kind of a right-angle triangle, but its long side would be caved in. Now say you mirror this triangle alo...
You, a young adventurer, are travelling through the forest. Suddenly, your path splits in 2. You have no map or compass, well, you do but your compass is broken. You know you have to keep travelling North, so how can you tell which direction to go in? You do not have much time, you must leave now! Where are you goin...
I just came up across this question in the mathematics stack exchange site and found it quite interesting: 100 autonomous robotic vehicles enter a warehouse in random order to park. Inside the warehouse, there are 100 sequential parking spaces enumerated from 1 to 100. Each vehicle has an assigned number where it will...
I just came up across this question in the mathematics stack exchange site and found it quite interesting: 100 autonomous robotic vehicles enter a warehouse in random order to park. Inside the warehouse, there are 100 sequential parking spaces enumerated from 1 to 100. Each vehicle has an assigned number where it wi...
You roll 5 dice and I'll always be able to give a number, you have to figure out how it works ~ Without looking it up. Here's a couple example rolls: 1,2,3,4,5 = 6 3,6,2,3,1 = 4 If you need any more rolls to determine the answer, comment them. Please try not to look it up, and if you do, don't answer it, it...
This is one of the most well-known wooden interlocking "Burr" puzzles, called The Chinese Cross. <br /><br /> If you look at the two images below, you can see pieces that are the same shapes as yours, but with each one a different color. Using the colors as a guide, you can see how they fit together in the assembled v...
One day a treasure hunter was searching for treasure on an abandoned island. He got tired of looking everywhere and so he walked towards a big tree that he saw in order to rest in its shade. As he approached the tree, he saw a board hanging on the tree. This was written on the board: >PETS A He understood tha...
One day a treasure hunter was searching for treasure on an abandoned island. He got tired of looking everywhere, so he walked towards a big tree that he saw in order to rest in its shade. As he approached the tree, he saw a board hanging on the tree. This was written on the board: > PETS A He understood that ...
What is the meaning of the following characters? "13579 vs U"
What is the meaning of the following characters? > 13579 vs U
What is the meaning of "13579 vs U"?
This is another example of an information puzzle. You are trying to find the most numbers a pair of spies can send to each other given that there are 26 stones in the river. Furthermore, the stones are all identical, and the only way the spies can communicate is by throwing a certain *number* of stones into the pond...
Suppose 9 men take 9 hours to dig 9 holes in the ground. (a) How many hours would it take 3 men to dig 3 holes? (b) How many men would it take to dig 54 holes in 54 hours?
I would repeat here a big part of answer on similar, but not identical question: http://puzzling.stackexchange.com/a/1666/28 . It solves this problem in **98 questions** at most, and in 50 questions if we are lucky. Let's call $M$ maximum number of faulty, which can be among group of chosen $N$ computers according t...
I have another thought. What if you started with a unit square blanket and took away the unit circle from the middle, like this: ![circle in a square][1] If you then took one quarter of that, you'd have kind of a right-angle triangle, but its long side would be caved in. Now say you mirror this triangle alo...
I heard from a clever person that for the problem mentioned before: http://puzzling.stackexchange.com/questions/251/i-dont-know-the-two-numbers-but-now-i-do a solution exists even if we change 100 to infinity. So the formulation would be next: > Two perfect logicians, Summer and Proctor, are told that integers x ...
**EDIT:** After some reflection and help/counter-examples seen in some other answers, I think this is either very close to, or is the correct answer. What about half of a square with a diagonal of 1, cut along the diagonal? For example: ![Square Diagonal][1] Using one of the triangles as the blanket, the ...
**EDIT:** *As pointed out by Falco and Ivo Becker in the comments, there are some shapes that do not fit. I will leave this answer here, however, since there is valuable info in the comments. Also, thanks to Mooing Duck for the pictures - better than the one I put up.* I have another thought. What if you st...
**EDIT:** After some reflection and help/counter-examples seen in some other answers, I think this is either very close to, or is the correct answer. What about half of a square with a diagonal of $1$, cut along the diagonal? For example: ![Square Diagonal][1] Using one of the triangles as the blanket, th...
I heard from a clever person that for the problem mentioned before: http://puzzling.stackexchange.com/questions/251/i-dont-know-the-two-numbers-but-now-i-do a solution exists even if we change 100 to infinity. So the formulation would be next: > Two perfect logicians, Summer and Proctor, are told that integers x ...
> There are $N$ men. $K$ of them are knights, $M$ of them are jokers. > $N$ is known, $K$ and $M$ are unknown. You know that: $K + M = N$, $K \gt M$, $M \ge 1$, $N$ is odd. > Knights always tell the truth, jokers can tell whatever they want. All $N$ people know who is who. You go to anyone of them and ask him a ...
**EDIT:** After some reflection and help/counter-examples seen in some other answers, I think this is either very close to, or is the correct answer. What about half of a square with a diagonal of $1$, cut along the diagonal? For example: ![Square Diagonal][1] Using one of the triangles as the blanket, th...
**EDIT:** After some reflection and help/counter-examples seen in some other answers, I think this is either very close to, or is the correct answer. What about half of a square with a diagonal of $1$, cut along the diagonal? For example: ![Square Diagonal][1] Using one of the triangles as the blanket, th...
**EDIT:** *As pointed out by Falco and Ivo Becker in the comments, there are some shapes that do not fit. I will leave this answer here, however, since there is valuable info in the comments. Also, thanks to Mooing Duck for the pictures - better than the one I put up.* I have another thought. What if you st...
**EDIT:** After some reflection and help/counter-examples seen in some other answers, I think this is either very close to, or is the correct answer. What about half of a square with a diagonal of $1$, cut along the diagonal? For example: ![Square Diagonal][1] Using one of the triangles as the blanket, th...
The correct answers are 3 and 54 hours. Why? Well I'm glad you asked!!! The men are all in a line and by force of habit just throw the dirt behind them. Unfortunately that falls into the hole of the person behind them. So the first one finishes in 1 hour, the second (now that no one is putting dirt in his hole) f...
I can't prove that the solution is unique, but the solution to the restricted version still works. According to [Joe Z.'s answer][1], Summer is given $x+y=17$, and Proctor is given $x \cdot y=52$. Also, to avoid confusion I'm going to call Proctor male and Summer female. Because $x \cdot y=52$, Proctor knows the num...
How far down the rabbit hole of not knowing can we go? While working on [the generalization][1] of [I don't know the two numbers... but now I do][2], I thought of these two extensions. Both have the same conditions, but a different conversation taking place: Conditions: > Two perfect logicians, Summer and Proctor...
A) 3 hours. Why? Well I'm glad you asked!!! The men are all in a line and by force of habit just throw the dirt behind them. Unfortunately that falls into the hole of the person behind them. So the first one finishes in 1 hour, the second (now that no one is putting dirt in his hole) finishes an hour after that. ...
In an alternative universe where the following is true: 1 + 1 = 3 2 + 2 = 7 1 + 2 = 5 What would ? be? 5 + 5 = ? YOU DO NOT NEED THE FOLLOWING TO FINISH: Extra equations: >!3 + 3 = 11, 4 + 4 = 15
Let's involve some maths in this question. I'll make some assumptions in order to simplify. Let's say humans have a perfect spheric head, with a surface of $S=4 \pi r^2$ and a radius of $20\text{ cm}$ (which is way bigger than the actual human head radius). This gives a surface of roughly $0.5$ square metres. Le...
Can you draw something on a piece of paper that looks like a square and a circle at the same time? ( without using Math or 3-d visualisation techniques)
How many queens can be placed in a standard $8*8$ chessboard to threat each of them exactly once by other queens?
How Many Queens to Threat Themselves?