Solve Enjoyable Enigmas with Mr.E's Challenge

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Discussion Overview

This thread invites participants to share and solve various puzzles, problems, and enigmas that require creative thinking. The scope includes cryptograms, logic puzzles, and hypothetical scenarios, with an emphasis on engaging the community in playful problem-solving.

Discussion Character

  • Exploratory
  • Debate/contested
  • Mathematical reasoning

Main Points Raised

  • One participant presents a coded message puzzle, suggesting that each letter represents a word, leading to various interpretations of the message.
  • Another participant questions the phrasing of the original puzzle, expressing concern over perceived misogyny.
  • Several participants engage in playful banter while attempting to decode the message, suggesting alternatives for the letters used.
  • A new puzzle is introduced involving cutting a cake into pieces, prompting discussions about fairness and the nature of the pieces.
  • Another participant presents a riddle involving princes and a princess, asking how a suitor can place a ring on her hand without leaving his corner.
  • Participants speculate about the nature of the solutions to the puzzles, with some suggesting the need for illusion or clever manipulation.
  • A physics-related puzzle is introduced, concerning a cork floating in water, with participants discussing the conditions necessary for it to remain centered.
  • One participant elaborates on the requirements for the glass shape in the cork puzzle, emphasizing the need for a constant height rim.
  • Another participant suggests that the cork's behavior may relate to the meniscus effect, while also humorously proposing an alternative solution involving the princess.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

Participants express a range of interpretations and solutions to the puzzles, with no clear consensus on the best approaches or answers. Disagreements arise regarding the phrasing of the original puzzle and the nature of the solutions proposed.

Contextual Notes

Some puzzles rely on specific assumptions about language and context, while others depend on the physical properties of objects involved. The discussions reflect varying levels of understanding and engagement with the puzzles presented.

Who May Find This Useful

Individuals interested in puzzles, logic problems, and creative thinking challenges may find this thread engaging and stimulating.

  • #901
I guess I'm not psychic enough to hang myself. :biggrin:
 
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  • #902
Er...noooo...Don't cut the cords.
 
  • #903
No! I'm not using my cloths to connect them.
 
  • #904
Gad said:
No! I'm not using my cloths to connect them.

*Shakes his head pendulously*
 
  • #905
Enigman said:
*Shakes his head pendulously*
Yes, I was going to suggest to Gad she ponder what young Galileo was pondering in church that fateful day.
 
  • #906
The ceiling is flat, what are you talking about? Bend the ceiling? Take off the ceiling and break it? ARGHH! I hate these puzzles that show just how dump I am.
 
  • #907
If it makes you feel any better, I didn't get it too.
#901 shows some promise...(no, you can't hang me.)
 
  • #908
Gad said:
The ceiling is flat, what are you talking about? Bend the ceiling? Take off the ceiling and break it? ARGHH! I hate these puzzles that show just how dump I am.
Galileo wasn't pondering the ceiling when the light bulb, or in those days, chandelier, appeared over his head.
 
  • #909
Maybe Enigman should write one of those word riddles for Gad, the solution being the clue word we've both been trying to feed her for the rope enigma.
 
  • #911
Enigman said:
Answer:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Functional_fixedness#Two-cord_problem
Interesting article.
For each object, you need to decouple its function from its form. McCaffrey (2012) shows a highly effective technique for doing so. As you break an object into its parts, ask yourself two questions. "Can I subdivide the current part further?" If yes, do so. "Does my current description imply a use?" If yes, create a more generic description involving its shape and material. For example, initially I divide a candle into its parts: wick and wax. The word 'wick' implies a use: burning to emit light. So, describe it more generically as a string. This brings to mind using the wick to tie things together (once I extract it from the wax). Since 'string' implies a use, I describe it more generically: interwoven fibrous strands. This brings to mind that I could use the wick to make a wig for my hamster. Since "interwoven fibrous strands" does not imply a use, I can stop working on wick and start working on wax. People trained in this technique solved 67% more problems that suffered from functional fixedness than a control group. This techniques systematically strips away all the layers of associated uses from an object and its parts.
A person whose prepared to deal with a balding hamster is prepared to deal with anything.
 
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  • #912
Enigman said:
You already answered it...
:confused:
Another psych enigma
You are given 2 cords hanging from the ceiling, and a plier. You must connect the cords, but they are just far enough apart that one cannot reach the other easily.


Stupid me. I assumed they can never reach each other.
 
  • #913
Herman, the hermit, spent his days walking the hills and dales, doing math in his head. Every day his walk was interrupted by a wide, shallow river. He had to bundle his clothes and lash them to the end of his walking stick, holding them above his head, while he walked across in water up to his neck. He dreamed of building a bridge.

There was, in fact, a tall tree growing right at the water's edge. Herman wondered if the tree were long enough to span the river. If it were, he could cut it down and walk across the tree everyday. Herman, though, had gone into hermitry with no dedicated measuring tools, or rope. He didn't know how wide the river was or how tall the tree.

One day he happened to arrive at the river at such a time of day that the tree's shadow reached just to the bank on the other side, cutting the river perpendicularly.

How could Herman use this fact to measure the tree and the river?
 
  • #914
Shadow of the stick should be shorter or of equal length to the stick itself. Similar triangles.
 
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  • #915
zoobyshoe said:
How could Herman use this fact to measure the tree and the river?

Can he use this fact AND his walking stick?
 
  • #916
Jonathan Scott said:
Can he use this fact AND his walking stick?

OK, I've now understood that Enigman had already got there, in that it seemed obvious to me to measure the ratio of the length of any other vertical object, such as a walking stick, to the length of its shadow, and knowing that I now understand what Enigman was saying, which got a little garbled!
 
  • #917
Migraine +coffee+ thermodynamic tables=gibberish
 
  • #918
Both right!

Herman needs to quickly mark off the length of the shadow of his walking stick on the ground when the stick is held vertically. He could do that by placing a pebble at the base and tip of the shadow. Then he would need to lay the stick down along this line segment. If the pebbles are further apart than his stick is long, then the tree is too short to span the river. He doesn't even need an exact ratio.
 
  • #919
Torty the tortoise lives around the corner from me. He's about 29cm long, nose to tail-end. One day as I was passing by I observed he was in motion. Fortunately I happened to have a Tortoise Speed Radar Gun with me. I pulled it from my backpack and clocked Torty moving at 10 furlongs per fortnight.

Which scenario might best explain this speed:

a.)Torty had been having an affair with the neighbor tortoise's wife. He'd just heard them arguing and knew the neighbor was after him. He was running for his life.

b.)Torty had been having an affair with the neighbor tortoise's wife. He'd just heard them arguing and knew the neighbor was after him. He was running for his life. Unfortunately, he and the neighbor's wife had downed 2 bottles of champagne the night before, and Torty was very hung over.
 
  • #920
How good a drinker is our adventuress (adventoise?)?
 
  • #921
Enigman said:
How good a drinker is our adventuress (adventoise?)?
In that scenario, they had a bottle each.
 
  • #922
I am going with a. A fight while having a hangover can't be too much fun.
 
  • #923
2km over 2 weeks makes the average speed like 0.0017 m/s, i think the tortoise had a little too much to drink at the time. Waay too drunk to be messing around with someone's wife in that condition
 
  • #924
I've been watching this thread all day and have become impatient at waiting for the last puzzle to be confirmed. So I'm posting this puzzle to see if anyone can solve it. (Be sure to make your guesses in spoiler tags!)

What is the next line in this series?
1
11
21
1211
111221
 
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  • #925
zoobyshoe said:
Torty the tortoise lives around the corner from me. He's about 29cm long, nose to tail-end. One day as I was passing by I observed he was in motion. Fortunately I happened to have a Tortoise Speed Radar Gun with me. I pulled it from my backpack and clocked Torty moving at 10 furlongs per fortnight.

Which scenario might best explain this speed:

a.)Torty had been having an affair with the neighbor tortoise's wife. He'd just heard them arguing and knew the neighbor was after him. He was running for his life.

b.)Torty had been having an affair with the neighbor tortoise's wife. He'd just heard them arguing and knew the neighbor was after him. He was running for his life. Unfortunately, he and the neighbor's wife had downed 2 bottles of champagne the night before, and Torty was very hung over.

Unless I missed something, scenario (b.) is identical to scenario (a.), word-for-word even, except with additional information. Invoking Occam's razor, scenario (a.) should be selected, since it makes the fewest assumptions [of the two choices].
 
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  • #926
Ooo...smart.
 
  • #927
lendav_rott said:
2km over 2 weeks makes the average speed like 0.0017 m/s, i think the tortoise had a little too much to drink at the time. Waay too drunk to be messing around with someone's wife in that condition
This is correct. Torty's speed is not very fast, even for a tortoise. He's only going about 9.98 cm per minute, or 1.66mm per second. A sober snail in good shape could pass him.

Although he's in fear of his life in both scenarios, in the second he is terribly hung over and can't get out of first gear, so to speak.
 
  • #928
collinsmark said:
Unless I missed something, scenario (b.) is identical to scenario (a.), word-for-word even, except with additional information. Invoking Occam's razor, scenario (a.) should be selected, since it makes the fewest assumptions [of the two choices].
The second scenario does not explicate the first. It contains a complication that doesn't exist in the first. If the first were true, we'd expect Torty to be moving very much faster. The only explanation for why a tortoise in fear of his life should be moving so slowly is offered in the second scenario.
 
  • #929
zoobyshoe said:
The second scenario does not explicate the first. It contains a complication that doesn't exist in the first. If the first were true, we'd expect Torty to be moving very much faster. The only explanation for why a tortoise in fear of his life should be moving so slowly is offered in the second scenario.
That thought had crossed my mind. Ten furlongs per fortnight (less than 2 millimeters per second) is very slow for a tortoise. That's even slow for a snail.

On the other hand, the riddle does put us in a peculiar universe where tortoises have extramarital affairs and quaff bottles of champagne. It's hard for me to imagine how slow a speed, or the cause of the slowness, would constitute out-of-the-ordinary in such a universe. :smile:
 
  • #930
ViperSRT3g said:
I've been watching this thread all day and have become impatient at waiting for the last puzzle to be confirmed. So I'm posting this puzzle to see if anyone can solve it. (Be sure to make your guesses in spoiler tags!)

What is the next line in this series?
1
11
21
1211
111221

I think I might have it, maybe. If so, this is my guess: 312211

The rule for generating the next number is to describe the number of consecutive digits in the present number (starting the most significant digits) and state those digits. Remove all punctuation and non-number words. Start with '1'.

1
So the next number is the numerical version of the statement,
One '1' ==> 11
The next number is the numerical version of the statement,
Two '1's == > 21
The next number is the numerical version of the statement,
One '2' and one '1' ==> 1211
The next number is,
One '1', one '2', and two '1's ==> 111221

Which brings us to the answer,
Three '1's, two '2's, and one 1 ==> 312211
 

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