Simple math question for dum dums

by JH 103 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  Farkel

  swan,

  : Spanner you are correct. The fifty cent piece is not a nickle and the other coin is a nickle. I think this came from one of my computer systems classes many years ago. I know one of our instructors used to pose questions like this to get us to think outside the box and try to look at all of the angles of a problem. He used to give us lots of logic problems too.

  Of course, that is all child's play. Here a tougher one for you:

  . . . . . . . . .

  I've drawn you a box which is defined by nine dots as coordinates. You have two challenges. The first one is very easy, the second one requires a little more thought.

  In the first challenge, I ask you to use a pen and draw a straight line (you can change directions, but all lines must be straight) through ALL of those dots without taking your pen off the paper. But you can only draw FOUR straight lines.

  This challenge is easy.

  Second challenge: draw one single straight line through those nine dots using a pen without ever changing the direction of that pen from where you started.

  Both of these challenges are "out of the box" thinking challenges, by the way.

  Well?

  Farkel

  Edited by - Farkel on 19 January 2003 1:15:6
• 

  Swan

  OK Farkel, I got the first one. If you number the dots :

  1 2 3

  4 5 6

  7 8 9

  The first line would be 1, 2, 3 and extend out past three. Down diagonally through 6 and 8 and extend down below 7, then up through 7, 4, and 1. The Last line is then 1, 5, 9

  I'm still think'n on the other puzzle. Is there any limit as to the thickness of that line?

  Tammy
• 

  Farkel

  Tammy,

  I'm always thrilled to meet people who can THINK!

  The first one was easy, and has been a classic puzzle since before I was in diapers. (And that was several hundred years ago!)

  :I'm still think'n on the other puzzle. Is there any limit as to the thickness of that line?

  Bingo! I never set any limits about the size or thickness of that "pen", did I? I'm impressed. Most people swear it cannot be solved. Then again, they are living in that "box" that was mentioned.

  You must like lateral thinking puzzles as I do: never take anything for granted in a riddle or puzzle. Things are not always as you think they might be.

  Never take anything for granted in the Watchtower Religion, either! Things are not always as you think they might be!

  Farkel
• 

  Swan

  Farkel,

  Maybe that's one of the reasons I escaped and my family didn't. I started observing big holes in the Wt and had serious doubts. When I did leave I still half believed and thought that Armaggeddon may be coming, but at least I will live the last remaining years my way. Then after I left I saw that they were wrong about Armageddon and was convinced I made the right decision. I didn't really investigate the "apostate" web sites very well, mostly for fear that if my family found out I was associating with "apostates" that it would further hinder my relationship with them. I finally came to the point where eight years later (last summer) I decided it couldn't hurt my relationship any more than it already was, and that's when I really began investigating their corruption (pedophiles, UN, Rand, etc.). I'm so glad I did.

  But when you grow up thinking a certain way, it is very hard to think outside that box. I began doing it, but it was so hard. A therapist once said to me, "You have no other frame of reference. It's like you were always told from birth that red is blue." How true.

  How ironic that the society always encouraged people to "reason from the scriptures" and to "make sure of all things" and when I did, it started to lead me away from them!

  Tammy
• 

  belbab

  This puzzle has been around for a long time too.

  There are six coins lying on a table in this pattern.

  Move one coin so the pattern looks like this. The coin you move must remain as part of the pattern.

  This is hard to show on computer, using real coins is simpler to demonstrate.

  belbab
• 

  belbab

  Here's another one.

  A big semi trailer truck is loaded with heavy machinery and is over height. The driver is barrelling down the highway and tries to go under an over pass. He slams on the brakes, too late, his truck jams tight under the overpass. A big tow truck comes cannot pull it out, another one comes still no success. A little kid, tugs on a policeman's jacket. The police man bends down and the kid whispers something in his ear. The policeman rises smiling, walks over to the tow truck drivers and the rig is removed in about ten minutes.

  What did the little kid whisper in the policeman's ear?
• 

  belbab

  Here"s another one, this one I swear to God is true.

  Three young guys are trying to make their first fortune salvaging logs off the beach. They would grunt and groan with peavies to roll the logs into the water and then tie on to it and pull it out. For equipment they had an old boat, with an old car engine it and also a big skiff to row into shore with. They tied the big boat to some rocks along the shore and were working along the beach, when it was noticed that the big boat was drifting a way. One of them ran along the beach and managed to climb on the boat and started it an ran it out a ways to deeper safer water. Then the motor stalled and he couldn't start it.

  The other two, dressed in heavy boots and working clothes, it was winter, and started to row out in the big skiff, but the skiff had been banged about so much that it leaked badly. They rowed out quite a ways until the boat was full of water reaching the level of their knees. They could row no longer and could only hold on to the sides of the boat, and hollar.

  Now at the same time, a big ferry boat was going by about a half a mile away. The man trying to start the bigger boat knew that when the four foot waves from the wake of the ferry reached the two distressed workers in the skiff, they would be gonners. Water cold, laced up boots, and winter clothes they would not last long.

  The old car engine wouldn't start. The young man was almost in tears. Suddenly a loud voice called out in his own head. He heard it and acted on it. And the two in distress were saved within a few minutes.

  What did the loud voice in the operators head say to him.
• 

  belbab

  OK you guys, just because you don't know the answers, you didn't have to run away mad!

  belbab has spoken
• 

  larc

  bebab, the boy told the policeman to tell the truck driver to take some air out of the tires to lower the height of the truck.
• 

  belbab

  you are right on for that one, larc

  belbab