MHB Solving the Dilemma: Taking 2 Different Pills Every Day

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The discussion revolves around a dilemma of taking two different pills, A and B, which look identical, without exceeding the safe dosage. A proposed solution involves splitting each of the four pills in half, resulting in four halves that could potentially be either pill A or B. However, participants express concern that this method does not guarantee a balanced intake, as there remains a risk of consuming more of one type than the other. The conversation highlights the uncertainty and potential danger in managing the dosage with indistinguishable pills. Ultimately, the challenge lies in ensuring the correct daily intake to avoid fatal consequences.
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The doctor told you to take 2 different kind of pills (Pill A, Pill B) for ten days everyday. Both pills look exactly the same (same weight, color, shape, size, etc…;).
If you take more than 1 pill of the same kind per day, you will die. Furthermore, if you do not take 1 Pill A, and 1 Pill B every day, you will also die.
One day, you got distracted and by mistake put 3 pills on the table 2 B pills and one A pill and you don't know which is which.

How can you survive?

I've already searched for the solution to this problem.
Adding 1 pill A to the 3 unknown pills and split each pill in half. Thus having a balanced dose.
Half of those you take and save the other half for the next day.

I still don't get it. Because there is still a posibility that I might take more dose of one pill than the other.

What you think?
 
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Hi paulmdrdo!

So we have 2 pills A and 2 pills B and do not know which is which.
If we take half of each pill and discard the other half, we will have 2 half pills A and 2 half pills B, won't we?
Swallowing all of those gives us 1 dose of pill A and 1 dose of pill B.
 
I like Serena said:
Hi paulmdrdo!

So we have 2 pills A and 2 pills B and do not know which is which.
If we take half of each pill and discard the other half, we will have 2 half pills A and 2 half pills B, won't we?
Swallowing all of those gives us 1 dose of pill A and 1 dose of pill B.

We have 4 pills in total. Splitting each pill into half we will have 4 half B pills and 4 half A pills. Since we don't know which is which, there is a posibility that you might take 3 half pills B and 1 half pill A or 3 half pills A and 1 half pill B or 4 half pills B or 4 half Pills A.
 
paulmdrdo said:
We have 4 pills in total. Splitting each pill into half we will have 4 half B pills and 4 half A pills. Since we don't know which is which, there is a posibility that you might take 3 half pills B and 1 half pill A or 3 half pills A and 1 half pill B or 4 half pills B or 4 half Pills A.
We have a total of $4$ pills. When we divide a pill in half, we keep one half with us and give the other half to our friend. We do this one by one for each pill. In the end we will be left be two halves of pill A and two halves of pill B.
 
Here is a little puzzle from the book 100 Geometric Games by Pierre Berloquin. The side of a small square is one meter long and the side of a larger square one and a half meters long. One vertex of the large square is at the center of the small square. The side of the large square cuts two sides of the small square into one- third parts and two-thirds parts. What is the area where the squares overlap?

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