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Thread: Riddles and puzzles

  1. #31
    Quote Originally Posted by RandBlade View Post
    You have 7 matches laid out in the following pattern:

    \/||=|

    How can you move just one match to make the equation true? You can't use one to change the = to does not equal.
    you're either going for both sides being 1 or 11. So I'm assuming you need an ASCII eye to make some random operation.
    "In a field where an overlooked bug could cost millions, you want people who will speak their minds, even if they’re sometimes obnoxious about it."

  2. #32
    You move one of the ones in the = to make it >?
    We're stuck in a bloody snowglobe.

  3. #33
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    you're either going for both sides being 1 or 11. So I'm assuming you need an ASCII eye to make some random operation.
    Close. Hint:
    Spoiler:
    Both sides end up equalling one.


    Quote Originally Posted by littlelolligagged View Post
    You move one of the ones in the = to make it >?
    No, there's no funny business.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  4. #34
    Quote Originally Posted by RandBlade View Post
    No, there's no funny business.
    Oh, please, the solution is absurdly funny business. It requires a specific form of mathematical notation that isn't really written that way in order to work.

  5. #35
    Quote Originally Posted by wiggin View Post
    Oh, please, the solution is absurdly funny business. It requires a specific form of mathematical notation that isn't really written that way in order to work.
    Spoiler:
    All one equal one?
    In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
    The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

  6. #36
    No, the common solution I've heard is:

    Spoiler:
    To take the I in the VII and make it a bar on top so it turns into sqrt(1). Blech.

  7. #37
    That does make more sense notationally

    I have a couple of books of mathematically inclined puzzles, I'll see about translating some if I can be bothered at some point
    In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
    The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

  8. #38
    Yes that's the answer.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  9. #39
    Quote Originally Posted by Nessus View Post
    That does make more sense notationally
    Come on, even if you were to use that sign to denote that operation (which, let's be honest, most mathematicians just use exponents because they're easier to manipulate and write coherently), you wouldn't write it like that. Eh.

    If we're doing math puzzles, we should just do math games. I always enjoyed playing four fours as a kid...

  10. #40
    Quote Originally Posted by wiggin View Post
    Come on, even if you were to use that sign to denote that operation (which, let's be honest, most mathematicians just use exponents because they're easier to manipulate and write coherently), you wouldn't write it like that. Eh.

    If we're doing math puzzles, we should just do math games. I always enjoyed playing four fours as a kid...
    Ugh, I hate having to converse inside spoilers, but

    Spoiler:
    for single numbers/variables I use the square root sign, it's with long, complicated expressions that it makes sense to bust out the ^½, or even better the ^-½. You are right that the modern sqrt operator doesn't look like that, but in match-stick ASCII that's what you're reduced to. Is is dumb, sure.


    Math games, you say? What's four fours?
    In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
    The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

  11. #41
    Four fours is a basic game we played each day in high school. You have to create the day's number using four instances of the number four and any non-numerical mathematical operators you want (generally people disallow logarithms because then it's too easy). Each day the day's number increments, and you're not allowed to repeat the solution someone else has posted. It's pretty easy to do the first hundred or so but then it can get challenging.

  12. #42
    Sounds...Interesting.

    Okay, after paging through the first book, a lot of these are kinda boring or geometrical and I'm not motivated enough to draw illustrations. Here's an old but relatively simple one, and *almost* physical, too!

    A cylinder with a height of 6 (arbitrary units, call them cm or inch or whichever your moon nation prefers) has been drilled perpendicularly against the surface of a solid sphere, extending through the sphere. What is the volume of the remaining sphere material?
    Last edited by Nessus; 08-29-2012 at 07:24 PM.
    In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
    The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

  13. #43
    It's easy to solve that with integration, but I'm curious if there's a simpler method. Let me think about it. (Also it would help if we knew the radius of the sphere?)

  14. #44
    Quote Originally Posted by wiggin View Post
    It's easy to solve that with integration, but I'm curious if there's a simpler method. Let me think about it. (Also it would help if we knew the radius of the sphere?)
    Fuck, it was supposed to length, not diameter
    In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
    The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

  15. #45
    A lady is 21 years older than her son.
    In six years time the son will be one fifth of her age.

    Where is the father?
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  16. #46
    Quote Originally Posted by RandBlade View Post
    A lady is 21 years older than her son.
    In six years time the son will be one fifth of her age.

    Where is the father?
    Spoiler:
    2 and a quarter years from meeting the mother?
    In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
    The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

  17. #47
    No do the maths again.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  18. #48
    Quote Originally Posted by RandBlade View Post
    No do the maths again.
    Maybe drunk math isn't my forte

    Spoiler:

    Y mom's age, X son's
    1st condition: Y = X +21
    2nd condition: X +6 = Y/5
    Plug 1 into 2, X + 6 = (X + 21)/5 = X/5 + 21/5
    Works to (4X)/5 = (21/5) - 6
    Whereby X = (5/4)*[(21/5 - 6)] = -2.25


    Where did I go wrong? With the initial conditions?
    In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
    The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

  19. #49
    Quote Originally Posted by Nessus View Post
    Maybe drunk math isn't my forte

    Spoiler:

    Y mom's age, X son's
    1st condition: Y = X +21
    2nd condition: X +6 = Y/5
    Plug 1 into 2, X + 6 = (X + 21)/5 = X/5 + 21/5
    Works to (4X)/5 = (21/5) - 6
    Whereby X = (5/4)*[(21/5 - 6)] = -2.25


    Where did I go wrong? With the initial conditions?
    Yep, 2nd condition was wrong!

    Spoiler:
    It's still a negative number?
    In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
    The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

  20. #50
    Isn't it obvious from the question itself what the answer must be? There's only one possible age where the given information would give you the answer.

  21. #51
    I want to get there by numbers
    In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
    The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

  22. #52
    Seriously, someone spoiler me here, I'm intoxicated and impatient

    Also maybe incontinent

    (Not really)
    In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
    The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

  23. #53
    Spoiler:
    The child's age is -3/4, so presumably the father is in the process of impregnating the mother. To within a 3 month margin of error.

  24. #54
    Right, that's what I got from my corrected computation but didn't remember

    Spoiler:
    the human gestation period


    or at least didn't think to connect it to the number I got. Ah well, at least I got the math right
    In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
    The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

  25. #55
    Quote Originally Posted by wiggin View Post
    No, the common solution I've heard is:

    Spoiler:
    To take the I in the VII and make it a bar on top so it turns into sqrt(1). Blech.
    Figured it wasn't going to be legit. You can't even type the answer as the riddle would want it. :\
    "In a field where an overlooked bug could cost millions, you want people who will speak their minds, even if they’re sometimes obnoxious about it."

  26. #56
    Spoiler:
    Second condition should be: X+6=(Y+6)/5

    The son is -9 months so father is pretty close to the mother

    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    Figured it wasn't going to be legit. You can't even type the answer as the riddle would want it. :\
    It's supposed to be a match puzzle, not a typed one. Sqrt symbol is still perfectly legit last I checked.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  27. #57


    Divide that up into 4 plots, each the same size and shape, each with a well and house.

    Quote Originally Posted by RandBlade View Post
    Sqrt symbol is still perfectly legit last I checked.
    I've never written the square root symbol with a capital V
    "In a field where an overlooked bug could cost millions, you want people who will speak their minds, even if they’re sometimes obnoxious about it."

  28. #58
    Well you put the start of the match going across above the second one so that it continues up (it's also the above the I remaining as it should be but can't type). Not exactly perfect, but for matchsticks it works. In fact works better than you can type it.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  29. #59
    Think I've figured yours out?
    Spoiler:
    AAABBB
    ACAAAB
    ACCABB
    CCDBBD
    CDDDBD
    CCCDDD

    Pattern of three across, right two, right one, left one, straight on and right one.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    ℬeing upset is understandable, but be upset at yourself for poor planning, not at the world by acting like a spoiled bitch during an interview.

  30. #60
    That seems to be correct
    "In a field where an overlooked bug could cost millions, you want people who will speak their minds, even if they’re sometimes obnoxious about it."

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