- #1
belliott4488
- 662
- 1
Okay, here's a follow-up of sorts to my earlier post about green-eyed people who must kill themselves.
It turns out that the stranger who caused all this trouble was later caught by a fishing boat and brought back to the town to be tried for his offense. He was, of course, sentenced to death, but the judge took pity on him and said, "You will hanged by the neck till dead at dawn on one of the next seven mornings, but so that you do not ever have to go to bed knowing that you will die the next day, I will not tell you what morning it will be."
The stranger, to everyone's surprise, started hooting and hollering and generally whooping it up, obviously quite pleased to hear this sentence. When the bailiff asked him why, he answered, "Well, I clearly can't be executed on the seventh morning, because then I'd know on the sixth night that I was going to die the next day, which the judge said he wouldn't allow. But if the seventh day isn't allowed, then the sixth day is the last day I can be executed, but on the 5th night I would then know that I was to die the next day, so the sixth day is out, too. The same reasoning works for the 4th, 3rd, 2nd, and 1st days - I'm off the hook!"
The stranger went off to his cell happy in the strength of his reasoning -- and was executed on the 4th morning, to his complete surprise.
What was wrong with his reasoning?
It turns out that the stranger who caused all this trouble was later caught by a fishing boat and brought back to the town to be tried for his offense. He was, of course, sentenced to death, but the judge took pity on him and said, "You will hanged by the neck till dead at dawn on one of the next seven mornings, but so that you do not ever have to go to bed knowing that you will die the next day, I will not tell you what morning it will be."
The stranger, to everyone's surprise, started hooting and hollering and generally whooping it up, obviously quite pleased to hear this sentence. When the bailiff asked him why, he answered, "Well, I clearly can't be executed on the seventh morning, because then I'd know on the sixth night that I was going to die the next day, which the judge said he wouldn't allow. But if the seventh day isn't allowed, then the sixth day is the last day I can be executed, but on the 5th night I would then know that I was to die the next day, so the sixth day is out, too. The same reasoning works for the 4th, 3rd, 2nd, and 1st days - I'm off the hook!"
The stranger went off to his cell happy in the strength of his reasoning -- and was executed on the 4th morning, to his complete surprise.
What was wrong with his reasoning?