Einstein's Intelligence Quiz ?

[phoenixthoth]

Isn't "who owns the fish" a loaded question? I mean, the german could have a python. Shouldn't it say, "if someone owns a fish, then who owns it?"

 

[K.J.Healey]

I remember doing this in the 6th grade. I had never seen a logic problem before, and had no idea how to go about solving it. What i ended up doing was making grids of each topic vs another. Like smokes vs pet, or pet vs house. Each was on a separate piece of paper and i stacked them in 3d. I found soem way to make connections by flipping back and forth, it was pretty fun. Took me about an hour to solve but only cause it took forever to setup.

 

[keynespaul]

i got a diff answer

Color green blue yellow red white
Nationality Norwegian german swede Brit dane
Drink coffee water Milk beer tea
Cigar blend prince dunhill blue master pall mall
Pets fish cats dogs horses birds


Answer is :The Norwegian has the fish

 

[davee123]

Answer is :The Norwegian has the fish

The problem is that this violates one of the poorly written clues:

"4. The green house is on the left of the white house"

Note that if you assume "is on the left somewhere" rather than "immediately next to", then there are apparently two possible answers!

DaveE

 

[keynespaul]

hi davee,
I would like to bring out a point here, when we consider clue#10 and #11,"10. The man who smokes Blend lives next door to the one who keeps cats.
11. The man who keeps horses lives next door to the man who smokes Dunhill

so I still say my answer is right, the green house is the very next house on the left,einstein might have specified it has " the green house is the left next to the white house" --I still say your answer is ALSO right. :)

 

[CompuChip]

I remember doing this in the 6th grade. I had never seen a logic problem before, and had no idea how to go about solving it. What i ended up doing was making grids of each topic vs another. Like smokes vs pet, or pet vs house. Each was on a separate piece of paper and i stacked them in 3d. I found soem way to make connections by flipping back and forth, it was pretty fun. Took me about an hour to solve but only cause it took forever to setup.

That's what I would do too, but then more like this (Spoiler warning the linked page contains the solution to the puzzle!) :)

[edit]I copy/pasted the link from the Dutch version, I see only now that Einstein is also mentioned on the page, and in fact the puzzle is literally there. So I added a warning to the link. [/edit]

 

[keynespaul]

so does it mean the solution is an ambiguity ?? :) :) :) :)

 

[davee123]

so does it mean the solution is an ambiguity ?? :) :) :) :)

I think it probably means that:

1) Einstein didn't write it
2) This isn't the original phrasing of the question

The other possibilities might be that the question was MEANT to be ambiguous just to prove the point that it was unsolvable with a unique solution, or that whoever initially wrote the question was just lazy, which is similarly understandable.

DaveE

 

[mathwonk]

here is a simple intelligence quiz:

1) do you believe that you learn more going to class than not going to class?

2) do you miss class more than once a month?

3) how do you reconcile the answers to 1) and 2)?


i have more, on other topics, if you passed this one.

 

[BillJx]

here is a simple intelligence quiz:

1) do you believe that you learn more going to class than not going to class?

2) do you miss class more than once a month?

3) how do you reconcile the answers to 1) and 2)?


i have more, on other topics, if you passed this one.

1) Depends on the class. For some courses all the material is available outside of class, and the main advantage of the classroom method is that it keeps you on schedule. If you're well disciplined, you can make better use of your time at home, even without considering travel time. Some courses require interaction, or there's material that's only presented in class, or you find the course difficult and need the instructor to clarify things.

2) For two years I completed my BA by doing a full course load along with full time shift work. I missed lots of classes, used my holidays one day at a time for class, and did what I could by correspondence. I also did some of my studying at work. I graduated with honors. So it can be done.

3) You can reconcile a "no" to 1 and "yes" to 2, , but if your answer to 1 is "yes" then you have to attend classes or accept lower grades. Sometimes life doesn't really give you a choice. You do what you got to do. There are lots of single working mothers in college too. I don't know how they do it.

4) There are bonus questions; consider this a bonus answer. To do anything beyond the norm, the main thing you need is a warped sense of priorities.

 

[Werg22]

It's the German who lives in the green house (which is the 4th house), drinks coffee and smokes Prince

Solution:

1. The Brit lives in a red house
2. The Swede keeps dogs as pets
3. The Dane drinks tea
4. The green house is on the left of the white house
5. The green house owner drinks coffee
6. The person who smokes Pall Mall rears birds
7. The owner of the yellow house smokes Dunhill
8. The man living in the house right in the middle drinks milk
9. The Norwegian lives in the first house
10. The man who smokes Blend lives next door to the one who keeps cats.
11. The man who keeps horses lives next door to the man who smokes Dunhill
12. The owner who smokes Blue Master drinks beer
13. The German smokes Prince
14. The Norwegian lives next to the blue house
15. The man who smokes Blend has a neighbor who drinks water

- The Norwegian lives in the first house, point 9.
- From point 9 and 14, we can infer that the second house is the blue one.
- Looking at point 4, the Norwegian cannot live in either the green or white house. Since the Brit lives in the red house and we know he does not live in the blue house, the Norwegian lives in the yellow house.
- The Norwegian smokes Dunhill, from point 7.
- The man in the blue house keeps horses, point 11.
- Point 5 and 8 allows us to infer that the green house is on the fourth position.
- The white house is hence, point 4, on 5th position. The Brit lives in the middle in the red house and drinks milk, point 1 and 8.
- The person in the green house drinks coffee, point 5.
- Point 12 cannot apply to the Norwegian, nor the German, nor the British, nor the Dane. Hence the Swede smokes Blue Master and drinks beer.
- From point 15, the Swede cannot live in the blue house. If he did, point 15 could not apply anywhere. He can neither live in the green house since he drinks beer. Hence he lives in the white house.
- Point 15 makes the Dane living in the green house an impossible scenario: neither of his neighbors drinks water. Hence the Dane lives in the blue house and the German lives in the green house.
- From point 15, the Norwegian drinks water (the Brit drinks milk, it cannot be him).
- The only possible choice for point 6 is the Brit. Hence, the Brit smokes Pall Mall and keeps birds.
- From point 10, the Norwegian keeps cats.

Voila!

We now know that the Norwegian keeps cats, the Dane keeps horses, the Brit keeps birds and the Swede keeps dogs. The German is hence the one who keeps fish.

 

[Schrodinger's Dog]

here is a simple intelligence quiz:

1) do you believe that you learn more going to class than not going to class?

Depends do I have access to the internet or a library or several textbooks or a phone? And am I on a course that has no tutorial access except for the means given before.

2) do you miss class more than once a month?

Yes but the reasons are irrelevant and not often, I am my own student but still studying under a professional body.

3) how do you reconcile the answers to 1) and 2)?

I don't they are non correlatory given myself as an example, so on a subjective level they mean nothing.

i have more, on other topics, if you passed this one.

Good because that one kinda sucked and the irony is palpable

OP: This problem is now a semantic one as it always was, and it's solvable fairly easily once you know the truth or the right question, which is kinda the whole point I think

 

[Ruian]

your right...

No, it doesn't. The puzzle stated there are five animals only.

The only way you can justify your position is if the quiz knows of a six animal that the german could have that is not a fish, but there are not six animals.

So, you are assuming a clue that isn't stated in the puzzle!

This is a problem people have when taking quizzes: they apply the quiz to the real world. In the real world, there are many animals, but in the quiz world, there are only five.

This is a LOGIC PUZZLE therefore the clues are in there... and the question
"WHO OWNS THE FISH" ---> contains a clue

 

[phoenixthoth]

This is a LOGIC PUZZLE therefore the clues are in there... and the question
"WHO OWNS THE FISH" ---> contains a clue

Could be a loaded question with the answer "no one."

Maybe it should be, "if someone mentioned owns a fish, who is it?"

 

[Ruian]

you must consider the possibilities

hi,

hi davee,
I would like to bring out a point here, when we consider clue#10 and #11,"10. The man who smokes Blend lives next door to the one who keeps cats.
11. The man who keeps horses lives next door to the man who smokes Dunhill

so I still say my answer is right, the green house is the very next house on the left,einstein might have specified it has " the green house is the left next to the white house" --I still say your answer is ALSO right. :)

your reasoning is either right or wrong... you still must consider the fact that
davee has a good point. when I solved this problem I also considered both...
the green house is... and the green house is somewhere... this is a logic puzzle the clues are there but you must consider the possibilities... if you only considered one than many... then your solution might be correct or wrong. sorry for my grammar

 

[Ruian]

Could be a loaded question with the answer "no one."

Maybe it should be, "if someone mentioned owns a fish, who is it?"

may i refer you to #51. it explains the "The" and "a"

 

[rockytriton]

I've seen this "Einstein" puzzle before, it took me about 10 mins to figure it out, I don't think it's really hard. Especially since my mom figured it out pretty quickly as well, she just created an excel spreadsheet to figure out the logic.

I've seen things saying that if you can figure this puzzle out you are some kind of super genius, I think that's bogus, I'd say something more like, "If you can figure out this puzzle, you have the ability to concentrate for more than 10 minutes at a time", which is still pretty flattering nowadays.

 

[AaronDesselle]

I'd like to offer a suggestion and have it discussed... It hit me the first time I saw the very last clue.

First, here is my logic, feel free to point out how wrong it is:

1) If supposedly only 2% of the population will get this, then the obvious solution that most people get in 30 minutes on some scratch paper, probably isn't it.
2) According to the rules, no one drinks the same thing
3) Everyone on the planet drinks water... Einstein, or whoever the made this puzzle, knows that.


So when I read the last clue, I saw it as a trick question... Try finishing it without knowing what the fifth drink actually is.

I've read people's ideas about the fish not being mentioned in the actual clues, therefore the puzzle can't be solved, but I think that's just them trying to explain why only 2% would get such an easy logic puzzle. Obviously the fish is one of the pets, duh. This puzzle is not unsolvable, it's just really hard without the fifth drink. Water doesn't count.

-Aaron Desselle

 

[ill4tune]

i can honestly say that i found an abstract way to solve Einstein's Intelligence quiz. It took me around 30 minutes and i didn't make a single mistake.

 

[ill4tune]

How many people solved it?

 

[Poseidon]

Well, for one, the person who had the fish would live on or nearby water, also that person would not own any pets that would be deleterious to the fish .

 

[Oerg]

I remembered i read somewhere that Einstein was quoted as saying that if you managed to solve it in under a time limit(I forgot what), then you make up the top few percentile of the population with the highest IQ/

 

[davee123]

I remembered i read somewhere that Einstein was quoted as saying that if you managed to solve it in under a time limit(I forgot what), then you make up the top few percentile of the population with the highest IQ/

You actually read that Einstein actually authored the problem? That would be extremely interesting, if true, although to date it seems that Einstein was NOT the author of the problem. If you read it online somewhere, it's highly doubtful that whoever said it got the information from a reliable source. I would doubt that Einstein was enough of a sociologist to start giving statistics on time limits and IQ for a problem he derived.

DaveE

 

[Oerg]

AHA! Here's the link!

http://www.geocities.com/citycollegechess/riddle.html

 

[kingwaffle]

geez people

ok. for people saying "no one owns a fish" ... what the hell, there's five people, five cigarettes, five drinks, and five pets, only four are specified who owns which animal, so, figure out who owns which animal, then you'll get who owns the fish.









ultimately, the Norwigan owns the fish, don't understand, send me messages on how

 

[ManDay]

Didnt reat the thread, but: This is a very old riddle and it therefore has some very old answering technique aswel.. SImply create a table of 5*5 rows and the same number of colums. the columns sound

housecolor 1 - hc 5 ... animal 1 to 5 ... etc etc

same with the rows. now read each statement, check the according field and cross out the rest of the column and the row. in the end the answer is left.

Who the **** is that "Einstein", anyway?!?

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

Who the **** is that "Einstein", anyway?!?

He's the fellow made famous by his quote: "I'm no Einstein."

 

[Noone]

Why all you are in the 98%...

Didnt reat the thread, but: This is a very old riddle and it therefore has some very old answering technique aswel.. SImply create a table of 5*5 rows and the same number of colums. the columns sound

housecolor 1 - hc 5 ... animal 1 to 5 ... etc etc

same with the rows. now read each statement, check the according field and cross out the rest of the column and the row. in the end the answer is left.

Who the **** is that "Einstein", anyway?!?

...98% of people try to create to solution and overthink it... and almost all people think they got in the 2% but it just means they landed in the 98%...due to the overthinking and the usage of time to find a solution to a problem that really isn't a problem to start off with...the reason why its 98% is because about 98% of the world would think alike, and try to solve the problem the same way, or along the same mean's...only 2% will just look at it and see it in the way that it was intended...(hence in the perception of the creator of it instead of in the perception of the person solving it)

 

[Noone]

--=(The person who own's the fish has 100% chance of owning the fish)=--

Which would mean that there would be no need for paper and pen, or even thinking...

Stop thinking in the box...unless you allways wana live in it :/

took me 2min to find the answer and i didnt use any math...just logic...which made all other hint's and information not needed, just totaly errelavent...

My answer has a higher % of being correct than all of your answers :/ i gusse that would make me the winner ^^

 

[davee123]

--=(The person who own's the fish has 100% chance of owning the fish)=--

Um... so the answer to all riddles is "The answer is the answer"?

Which would mean that there would be no need for paper and pen, or even thinking...

Yeah, I guess that WOULD eliminate the need for thinking.

DaveE

 

[thewylie]

much negative boolean

11 minutes using a spreadsheat ... 1 minute to read the problem through once - 1 minute to start up Excel and set up tables - 9 minutes to solve problem, ... 3 5x5 tables ... 1 for dropping in hints, 2nd for organizing hints as they become related through direct fact supply or negative boolean deduction, 3rd for final arrangement of hints

Dane-Tea ... hahahaha ... aren't they just?

 

[Noone]

Um... so the answer to all riddles is "The answer is the answer"?



Yeah, I guess that WOULD eliminate the need for thinking.

DaveE

The riddle is logicaly a trick riddle... only 2% will ever use logic to try to prove or disprove what it really is in the intended perception of the creater :/

Yes the answer is the answer, because it has a 100% chance of being correct, and all other answer's would have less of a % of being true...

it eliminates the need for thinking inside the box, about a pointless riddle, because the only point it has would be the point you give it, but what matter's the most would be the intended point of the creater :/ allso only 2% of people that look's at it would say an answer in this such way, one that lead's to so meany other thought's "."

but really it's 97%,1%,1% allso logic would dictate that it would have to be :/ for it to be correct in the way that it was said :/

 

[BryanP]

Solved it in 20 minutes. It took more time "writing" the stuff down than actually solving it *chuckles* .

Just made a table and you can use process of elimination. Make a table consisting of the pets listed, beverages, and cigars or whatevers. Then just cross them out.

Here's my table:

yellow - norwegian - cats - dunhill - water
blue - dane - horses - blend - tea
red - brit - birds - pall mall - milk
green - german - fish (by elimination) - prince - coffee
white - swede - dogs - bluemaster - beer

 

[davee123]

The riddle is logicaly a trick riddle...

I really don't think there's a "trick" in the traditional sense of the word. "Trick questions" typically imply that there's some sort of half-truth or non-standard definition or wording in the question that's intended to "trick" people into thinking that an implication is true, when in fact, it's false. But I don't think that's the case. It's a slightly more difficult than normal logic puzzle with an answer that's logically verifiable.

only 2% will ever use logic to try to prove or disprove what it really is in the intended perception of the creater :/

You're saying that only 2% will argue about whether or not the author's intent was to be a trick question, and that the 2% is in some way related to the 2% that are claimed to be able to solve the puzzle?

Yes the answer is the answer, because it has a 100% chance of being correct, and all other answer's would have less of a % of being true...

That's like saying you can't lose if you don't try. That's true, of course, but you can't win either. You don't even have to try and think if you just say "the person who owns the fish owns the fish".

it eliminates the need for thinking inside the box,

It eliminates the need for thinking, period. You're NOT thinking outside the box, you're just not thinking at all-- THAT'S the problem as I see it. Thinking outside the box would be to come up with plausible "tricks" that the author could have intended which result in a different answer. By not thinking at all, you don't have any kind of answer.

about a pointless riddle, because the only point it has would be the point you give it, but what matter's the most would be the intended point of the creater :/

Yes. That's the point of the riddle-- to try and figure out what the author intended by following the clues they've given you. If you can do it, bravo! If you can't, well, you weren't up to the challenge, I guess.

allso only 2% of people that look's at it would say an answer in this such way, one that lead's to so meany other thought's "."

but really it's 97%,1%,1% allso logic would dictate that it would have to be :/ for it to be correct in the way that it was said :/

97%, 1%, 1%? What? I'm totally lost. Why don't these numbers total 100%? What does the 97% represent? What does the first 1% represent? The second 1%? And where did that missing 1% go? What logic are you talking about?

DaveE

 

[thewylie]

it does say using logic and doesn't ask for a specific property of the fish owner like house, or nationality?

One could validly say "Gunter owns the fish" but that doesn't use logic.

Since the fish is not specifically assigned a clue and even when the entire grid is populated is only obvious because it goes in the "last empty field", and it's not even stated in the problem's setup that a fish is one of the 5 pets owned by one of the 5 people, it's not possible with certainty to say any of them own a fish. The german may own a rabid bobcat for all we know. However, if we are told a fish is one of the five different pets and asked what the specific nationality is of the person who owns the fish, we can (with relative assuredness) claim specificaly that the the german owns the fish.

In that context one could try to answer (using logic): The nationality of the person who owns the fish is that which is not a member of the group nationalities of the people who own the dog, cat, bird, goblin (or horse if you prefer) respectively.

That person though, would have failed the part of the revised question asking for the specific nationality of the fish owner.


Who owns the fish? God
Who owns the fish? A human being
Who owns the fish? What fish? I see no fishies!
Who owns the fish? Can anyone really own anything? What is the nature of property in relation to the significant I? I know I exist but I'm not sure about anyone else, therefor, IF the fish exists at all, I will claim that I own it and all things until some entity proves otherwise.

 

[kts123]

It took me around two hours to finally solve the problem.

... I then showed it to my mom, she got it in half an hour. I must say, I'm impressed. XD

 

[esbo]

It took me around two hours to finally solve the problem.

... I then showed it to my mom, she got it in half an hour. I must say, I'm impressed. XD

Solved it too, Took me about 2 hours too, but I was playing poker as well for some of that
time, I also had looked at it yesterday, but not really tried to solve it, just
determine what type of problem it was.

Well at least I think I have solved it anyway, not going to post my answer as a spoiler
(unless it has already been posted).

It would help if you had some sort of 'tool' to help you, I just had a text editor,
I don't think I could do it without something to write on. I think there is an element
of 'luck' in finding the solution.
Maybe women find these types of puzzles easier, I think they are meant to be better
at doing a lot of things at the same time, ie multitasking, than men and there seems
to be an element of multitasking involved, although in a way it is purely sequential
in method.

 

[esbo]

Here is my table


norway. yellow. water... cats... dunhill
dane... blue... tea... horses.. blend
brit... red... milk... birds... pall mall
german. green.. coffee.. fish... princes
swede.. white.. bear... dogs... blue master

I notice most gave their table with the rows and colums transposed
compared to mine. Except the last one BrianP.
It seemed more logical to identify the people by their nationality, although
I did notice IIRC that you solved in this order

colours nationality drinks cigars pets
or maybe
colours drinks nationality cigars pets

In a way however it was rather laborious testing your memory or something like that,
rather then a real test where you have to hammer pegs into the correct shaped holes.

 

[jaslyn]

Sorry to bump up an old thread, but I realized that keynespaul actually brought up a very important point. This puzzle is actually in fact not solvable with the current clues given, and I'm not talking about the 'there is no mention of a fish' thing.

#4: The green house is on the left of the white house
#10: The man who smokes Blend lives next door to the one who keeps cats
#11: The man who keeps horses lives next door to the man who smokes Dunhill

From this we can clearly see that the green house can be anywhere on the left of the white house. It could be right beside it, it could be 1 house away, 2 houses away and so on. It does not necessarily mean that it's right beside the white house, as it would have used more specific words rather than 'left of'.

Unless we can safely say that the green house is on the immediate left of the white house, it is impossible to solve this quiz. I'm unable to proceed further than this with 100% certainty.

Norwegian
Blue
Milk

From this I can make 2 assumptions which can lead to 2 different answers, both of which are correct.

 

[ƒ(x)]

Haha, some of these posts make me laugh. After writing down the rules it took me an entire 15 minutes to figure it out.

Spoiler

P.S. In case you haven't realized this, the German has the fish.

 

[ƒ(x)]

Sorry to bump up an old thread, but I realized that keynespaul actually brought up a very important point. This puzzle is actually in fact not solvable with the current clues given, and I'm not talking about the 'there is no mention of a fish' thing.

I'm terribly sorry to be the one to inform you of this, but the riddle is solvable.

 

[ƒ(x)]

#4: The green house is on the left of the white house
#10: The man who smokes Blend lives next door to the one who keeps cats
#11: The man who keeps horses lives next door to the man who smokes Dunhill

From this we can clearly see that the green house can be anywhere on the left of the white house. It could be right beside it, it could be 1 house away, 2 houses away and so on. It does not necessarily mean that it's right beside the white house, as it would have used more specific words rather than 'left of'.

Unless we can safely say that the green house is on the immediate left of the white house, it is impossible to solve this quiz. I'm unable to proceed further than this with 100% certainty.

*sighs and facepalms* OK, so you deduced that the green house could be anywhere to the left of the white one? Have you tried reading the original problem--there are two versions of this riddle by the way, one of which states what your clue says and the other states that the green house is "next to, and on the left of the white house."

 

[LeePhilip01]

Lol ur right... I DO feel like the man...!

Although it took me abt an hour lol...

 

[walbobo]

i have solved it in 3o minutes the german has fish

 

[secrets]

I have the unhappy news of informing you that.. you are all wrong.. after realizing the simplicity of the question... I decided to look for people making the same assumption that I did.. "its the german" but as a question from einstein.. you need to think a little deeper.. think outside the box, at no point in the hints is the word fish even mentioned, you are assuming that somebody owns the fish... at no point is there any proof of this, einstein is carefull to keep his question from the hints, this is why such a small majority of the population will ever answer this correctly... don't feel bad if your wrong, its einstein for crying out loud, he was far ahead of his time, deal with it.

and the best part is the person looked at as wrong is the closest to being right on this discusion..

"--=(The person who own's the fish has 100% chance of owning the fish)=--"

for a more details...
http://www.amazeingart.com/fun/einstein-quiz-answer.html

 

[Sorry!]

LOL man i was doing this riddle by using a chart i had everything laid out and then i realized there weren't any damn clues for where the fish is anyways so who knows where the fish is?

i ASSUME that the fish would live in the last empty spot with the german green house # 4... but i don't know at the bottom it says that the riddle can be solved with just the 15 clues given above so placing no assumptions into it. hmmmm

i'd have to go with the german may or may not own fish as his pets.

did it in about 15 minutes wasn't really hard just was getting distracted by t.v. lol.. all you have to do is look for the next 'oh that MUST go there' like a sudoku..

EDIT:

looked through all the other answers people have given compared my chart to there's all are similar.. noticed other people picked out that there are no clues to where the fish is...

i'm just wondering is my line of thinking WRONG ?

 

[KyleDevon]

lol! That is a good intelligence test. But I don't think it should be called Einstein's. Anyway, there is a lot good activities and intelligence games like http://www.poker-card-index.com/poker-guide . I have heard it was used in experiment with children intelligence. I think this blog is close to one I've read:

http://yelloworchid33.livejournal.com/1273.html

 

[coxcomb]

If we assume one of the people own a fish, (from left to right)
House #1-Norwegian, yellow house, water, cats, Dunhill
House #2-Dane, blue, tea, horses, Blend
House #3-Brit, red, milk, birds, Pallmall
House #4-German, green, coffee, FISH, Prince
House #5-Swede, white, beer, dogs, Bluemaster
My physics teacher gave this to my class in the beginning of the year. It took me 20-25 minutes. I was actually rather motivated because of the 2% part.
I couldn't solve the next brain teaser he gave us, though.
(Three people check into a hotel. They pay the bellboy 30 dollars as rent or whatever. The bellboy finds out that the rent is actually 25 dollars. He takes five dollars with him. Thinking it would be hard to split between three people, he gives each of them one dollar back and pockets the remaining two dollars. So if you think about it, each of those three people gave ten dollars and got back one dollar. So (10-1)*3=27. The bellboy has 2 dollars. It equals 29 dollars in all. Where is the remaining dollar?)
Ugh...if you try to solve it backwards...it works out somewhat, but if you think about it in terms of each person paying 10 and getting one back, I get confused. Heh...I wonder what percentage of the world can explain this one...

 

[davee123]

Three people check into a hotel. They pay the bellboy 30 dollars as rent or whatever. The bellboy finds out that the rent is actually 25 dollars. He takes five dollars with him. Thinking it would be hard to split between three people, he gives each of them one dollar back and pockets the remaining two dollars. So if you think about it, each of those three people gave ten dollars and got back one dollar. So (10-1)*3=27. The bellboy has 2 dollars. It equals 29 dollars in all. Where is the remaining dollar?

That's a classic, because it's confusing. They each paid 9 dollars, which means the total they paid was $27. But $2 of their combined $27 went to the bellboy, and the remaining $25 went to the room fee. The trick is that they're adding the bellboy's $2 to the total paid rather than subtracting.

DaveE

 

[blighty]

after 10 minutes of head scratching I'm plumping for the
german who owned the fish.

Gonna feel stupid if I'm wrong, Lol



ED, YAY! I was right, *buffs knuckles on me hoody :D

ED 2, After reading the "real" answer I feel conned, :D
at least i didn't waste to much time on it.

Lol.