Have you solved Wedding Whoopsies yet?
In fact someone already has! Several people actually. I wonder if my puzzle was in fact too easy, though I did have to make those hints to help out.
In all fairness, however, those hints probably were of extremely little assistance, but I am so relieved it's possible for at least some people to come to a sound solution.
More coming up shortly!
Tuesday, 27 January 2015
Friday, 16 January 2015
Clues for Wedding Whoopsies!
1. In order to find out who ordered what, you first need to figure out who is lying and who is telling the truth.
2. Whether someone is telling the truth or lying depends on two things; what he/she ordered and what the neighbours ordered.
Since everyone is a neighbour of two people, as you change your theory on what any one person ordered you also need to change your assumption of not only the truth-value of that person, but also the truth-value of his/her neighbours.
3. Let's assume that two guests sitting next to each other both ordered A, which we don't know is Fish or Meat. Regardless of which is the case, all A are the same for all guests who ordered that.
Each of these guests has one more neighbour, both whom ordered B, which we also don't know is Fish or Meat, and may or may not be the same thing as A. All we know is that everyone who ordered B has the same thing, just as everyone who ordered A has the same thing.
From this we can't know if any of the guests are lying or telling the truth, but two of the guests are in fact sitting next to someone who ordered A and another who ordered B, which means that they have the same truth-value; if one of them is lying, the other one is lying too! And if one of them is a truth-teller, the other one is also a truth-teller!
But I am not saying this is definitely the case. It's just something that might be worth thinking about.
Sunday, 14 December 2014
Wedding Whoopsies!
Disaster occured!
Christine the waitress was hired to wait tables at a wedding where the guests had their pick between fish or meat, but all the invitations for Table-13 had been misplaced! Not one person in the kitchen had any idea how many of what dish had been ordered, much less who had ordered what! Panic spread across the kitchen as dinner-time enroached, but Christine was, in fact, not completely clueless!
For instance, she knew all of the guests were either zealously Christian, refusing to speak a single word unless they knew for certain what they said was unambigiously the truth; or patheological liars, so addicted to deceit they were unable to say anything unless they knew for sure it was the untruth.
She also managed to remember that all zealously Christian guests had ordered the meat only if the two people sitting next to them had ordered the same thing as each other, and had ordered the fish only if the person on their right had ordered a different course from the person on their left. By remarkable coincidence the patheological liars displayed completely opposite behaviours!
Christine drew a map of how the guests at Table-13 were placed:
After interviewing the guests briefly she managed to come up with some info that might prove useful:
Christine the waitress was hired to wait tables at a wedding where the guests had their pick between fish or meat, but all the invitations for Table-13 had been misplaced! Not one person in the kitchen had any idea how many of what dish had been ordered, much less who had ordered what! Panic spread across the kitchen as dinner-time enroached, but Christine was, in fact, not completely clueless!
For instance, she knew all of the guests were either zealously Christian, refusing to speak a single word unless they knew for certain what they said was unambigiously the truth; or patheological liars, so addicted to deceit they were unable to say anything unless they knew for sure it was the untruth.
She also managed to remember that all zealously Christian guests had ordered the meat only if the two people sitting next to them had ordered the same thing as each other, and had ordered the fish only if the person on their right had ordered a different course from the person on their left. By remarkable coincidence the patheological liars displayed completely opposite behaviours!
Christine drew a map of how the guests at Table-13 were placed:
- BILLY: Everyone in this table ordered the fish.
- ELLEN: I most certaintly did not order whatever Billy is having!
- ANNA: Half the people here ordered the fish, the other half ordered meat.
- DANIEL: Don't believe a word Ellen says. She is definitely lying!
- FLORA: It's funny how all the people who ordered the meat are sitting together in a row!
Wednesday, 26 November 2014
Book burning!
This is not a fun post. Okay, maybe it will be. I can't help being funny, but this is a post about something I care about, and which I hope you care about as well.
The destruction of books is something barbaric. Books are our culture. Those who came before us live through their written words, and they contain part of our history; the reason we live the way we live now.
Nothing can replace that, ever.
No, not even burning Twilight is okay!
To destroy a book is the equivalent of murder, and I can't see how the opposite can be true. If someone disagree, please, explain to me. I would really like to know how you can burn yours or someone else's legacy then sleep comfortably that night.
Even if you don't think exactly that, very few would say that books ought to be destroyed. Yet that is exactly what is happening. Right now.
NOW!
I am not just talking about the normal wear and tear problem of simply failing to preserve the literature. At the moment of reading, people around the world, in your very hometown, engage in a concious and organized effort to destroy hundreds of books, and yes, it is probably by means of burning.
They are not bad people, mind you. See, books spends most of their natural life in something called "the market". Be it the library, the bookstore, antique store or second-hand shop, they always seem to find a way to get back that price-tag or that stamp.
Make no mistake though. The market is harsh and unforgiving, and not many, be it people or books, can survive there.
I've seen this happen with my own eyes. In fact, I admit to have partaken in this.
I used to work an internship back at Myrorna, a Swedish chain store run by and for the Salvation army, and sell second-hand wares; anything from toys to art to furniture. And books.
The idea is simple: accept gifts from people, sell them really cheaply and give all profits to charity. A viable alternative to driving all the way to the dump, the givers get to feel like they contribute, people with low income gets somewhere to buy necessities and the truly needing gets a much needed penny. Seems very nice on paper, but unfortunately not everything on paper transfers as neatly into reality. "The market" and "charity" don't really combine, and these types of companies are made to do things that the world probably would be better off without.
Many of their wares cannot be sold, and needs to be replaced by new wares that might sell better. When books don't survive the market, they are given a viking funeral, by which I mean they are burned ( thrown into the burnable trash at least, but I assume that it's "burnable" because they are supposed to burn at one point ).
So yes, literal book burning happens. Not just to worn-out books, or books whose popularity well exceeds their quality, but really old books from the 19th century and, I swear, from the FUCKING RENAISSANCE!
I could not afford to protest. I too am at the mercy of a cruel market that doesn't tolerate rebellious attitudes. I do judge them, and myself, but merely complaining is not going to make a difference.
We need action.
We need money.
We need information.
But first and foremost, we need awareness.
So please, dear reader. Whoever you are, spread the word. Tell your parents. Your brother. Your sister. Your newspaper. Your paperboy. Your milkman. Your cat. Tell everyone you meet, and tell them to spread the message. We are at a pivotal point in history, where we once and for all need to consider if our legacy matters to us, if the written language matters to us and if ideas matter to us.
There are people who need books in the world. Prisons, schools, children of developing countries. There are people who need to get rid of books.
There must be a way for these people to meet with each other.
My dream is to buy unmarketable books from stores and libraries, stock them and give them away to the needy. And I would like to think it can be done.
For more information, please visit this CRACKED article, which was the first thing that popped up when I Googled "book destruction".
In my defense, it's kind of a hard subject to research.
The destruction of books is something barbaric. Books are our culture. Those who came before us live through their written words, and they contain part of our history; the reason we live the way we live now.
Nothing can replace that, ever.
No, not even burning Twilight is okay!
To destroy a book is the equivalent of murder, and I can't see how the opposite can be true. If someone disagree, please, explain to me. I would really like to know how you can burn yours or someone else's legacy then sleep comfortably that night.
Even if you don't think exactly that, very few would say that books ought to be destroyed. Yet that is exactly what is happening. Right now.
NOW!
I am not just talking about the normal wear and tear problem of simply failing to preserve the literature. At the moment of reading, people around the world, in your very hometown, engage in a concious and organized effort to destroy hundreds of books, and yes, it is probably by means of burning.
They are not bad people, mind you. See, books spends most of their natural life in something called "the market". Be it the library, the bookstore, antique store or second-hand shop, they always seem to find a way to get back that price-tag or that stamp.
Make no mistake though. The market is harsh and unforgiving, and not many, be it people or books, can survive there.
I've seen this happen with my own eyes. In fact, I admit to have partaken in this.
I used to work an internship back at Myrorna, a Swedish chain store run by and for the Salvation army, and sell second-hand wares; anything from toys to art to furniture. And books.
The idea is simple: accept gifts from people, sell them really cheaply and give all profits to charity. A viable alternative to driving all the way to the dump, the givers get to feel like they contribute, people with low income gets somewhere to buy necessities and the truly needing gets a much needed penny. Seems very nice on paper, but unfortunately not everything on paper transfers as neatly into reality. "The market" and "charity" don't really combine, and these types of companies are made to do things that the world probably would be better off without.
Many of their wares cannot be sold, and needs to be replaced by new wares that might sell better. When books don't survive the market, they are given a viking funeral, by which I mean they are burned ( thrown into the burnable trash at least, but I assume that it's "burnable" because they are supposed to burn at one point ).
So yes, literal book burning happens. Not just to worn-out books, or books whose popularity well exceeds their quality, but really old books from the 19th century and, I swear, from the FUCKING RENAISSANCE!
I could not afford to protest. I too am at the mercy of a cruel market that doesn't tolerate rebellious attitudes. I do judge them, and myself, but merely complaining is not going to make a difference.
We need action.
We need money.
We need information.
But first and foremost, we need awareness.
So please, dear reader. Whoever you are, spread the word. Tell your parents. Your brother. Your sister. Your newspaper. Your paperboy. Your milkman. Your cat. Tell everyone you meet, and tell them to spread the message. We are at a pivotal point in history, where we once and for all need to consider if our legacy matters to us, if the written language matters to us and if ideas matter to us.
There are people who need books in the world. Prisons, schools, children of developing countries. There are people who need to get rid of books.
There must be a way for these people to meet with each other.
My dream is to buy unmarketable books from stores and libraries, stock them and give them away to the needy. And I would like to think it can be done.
For more information, please visit this CRACKED article, which was the first thing that popped up when I Googled "book destruction".
In my defense, it's kind of a hard subject to research.
Monday, 20 October 2014
Happy Birthday!
Another friend of mine have her birthday today!
Hooray for friends!
You won't see many of these posts. I have some friends and family that mean the world to me and some people I look up to, and I wish to commemorate all the laps around the sun that have elapsed since their separation with their mothers' anatomy; but their birthdays are all concentrated into a single short period of time!
So what did I decide to give her? Well, I am a big fan of "it's the thought that counts", because other than thinking there is not much that I can offer. With that in mind, I decided to give her what I believe she wants more than anything right now.
Are you ready?
Here it comes!
This person is one of the most lucid people I know, yet she is frequently exposed night in and night out with shit that noone of her intellect should need to deal with.
Insanity in my mind originates from peoples' inability to make sense of the world, and that in turn can be attributed to the common belief there are things that cannot be made sense out of. After all, once you accept there are things that cannot be made sense out of, and you fail to immediately make sense out of something in turn, it is natural to think that is impossible to make sense of. In that spirit, I shall tackle some notorious paradoxes and expose them to the world!
All in her name ( of course, I don't want to give away her name in this blog ).
Zeno's Paradox
I have a little trouble coming up with a sufficient rolution of this problem only because I never really understood wherein the problem lies, and thus what solution would satisfy it. Nevertheless it occurs to me that whenever the tortoise is ahead of Achilles, it will be because he hasn't surpassed the tortoise yet; he is not yet out of the temporal frame of reference wherein the tortoise is ahead, and that will never be subverted no matter how many fractions are added, because the fractions will always be too small to make a difference. Let me demonstrate this with a well known constant: e
In simple terms; e is the sum of the reciprocals of the factorials of all positive integers.
... that didn't turn out very simple, did it?
It's basically just an infinite addition of fractions, each fractions significantly lower than the last:
1 + ( 1/1 ) + ( 1/ ( 1*2 ) ) + ( 1/ ( 1*2*3 ) ) + ( 1/ ( 1*2*3*4 ) ).....
And so on. Essentially you add one more factor to the denominator every time, always divided into 1 and then added to the soup.
There is no limit to how many times you can add into this, and each addition comes closer to e. And yet, we know that e is not only less than 3, it's less than 2.7182818284590452353602877!
It's the same deal with this "paradox"; of course there are infinitely many infinitely fine instances where the tortoise is ahead; that's true for ALL moments! That doesn't mean that in all moments the tortoise is ahead.
Unless Achilles trips and cracks his skull, but as far as I am concerned that is not part of this paradox.
Proof the Easter Bunny Exists
This is what we in the logic business call "circular reasoning":
As soon as someone proposed the concept of an Existing Easter Bunny, they already accepted the existence of the Easter Bunny; so proving its existence after that is kind of moot.
The Easter Bunny herself have, of course no obligation to exist just because we say so!
Right Triangle Paradox
First, that adding a square-unit to an object doesn't change its size, and second that rearranging the components of an object doesn't change its shape. In order to debunk this paradox we need to disprove both.
First things first, does the object actually maintain its size?
Why, look at that! Once the triangles overlap you'll see they are not as similar after all! That little beer-belly might not seem big, but I bet it just about corresponds to the area of one square!
But that drives us to the next paradox. If one trianle is bigger, you'd think the components would also be differently sized, but upon examining it I find that not to be the case. So is there a paradox after all?
Wait a minute! Triangles don't have bellies! And look:
No matter how hard I try I cannot make a straight line match the hypotenuse!
That's no triangle! It's an imposter!
And look! It turns out it was Adam from that one episode of Catfish!
Now it all makes sense!
In all seriousness, if it doesn't behave like a triangle it is in all likelihood not a triangle. The red and blue shapes were designed to be intercompatible while still appearing as parts of a triangle. If you were to try and do that with the real deals it probably wouldn't turn out that way. In short, it's an optic illusion.
What can I say?
Seeing is not believing. Imperical testing is.
And these are my three paradoxes; all of them resolved!
My friend! There might be moments out there when life seem to consist out of paradoxes. Everything moves too fast, and you feel as if you can't keep up. The paradoxes you face may be much more perplexing than the ones I faced today; but that just makes them more worth solving!
I believe that for all the lies, delusions and empty words circulating across the world, there is still truth and beauty; there is still sanity. And I hope you discover that some day!
Hooray for friends!
You won't see many of these posts. I have some friends and family that mean the world to me and some people I look up to, and I wish to commemorate all the laps around the sun that have elapsed since their separation with their mothers' anatomy; but their birthdays are all concentrated into a single short period of time!
So what did I decide to give her? Well, I am a big fan of "it's the thought that counts", because other than thinking there is not much that I can offer. With that in mind, I decided to give her what I believe she wants more than anything right now.
Are you ready?
Here it comes!
A SHORT RESPITE FROM ALL THE INSANITY IN THE WORLD!
This person is one of the most lucid people I know, yet she is frequently exposed night in and night out with shit that noone of her intellect should need to deal with.
Insanity in my mind originates from peoples' inability to make sense of the world, and that in turn can be attributed to the common belief there are things that cannot be made sense out of. After all, once you accept there are things that cannot be made sense out of, and you fail to immediately make sense out of something in turn, it is natural to think that is impossible to make sense of. In that spirit, I shall tackle some notorious paradoxes and expose them to the world!
All in her name ( of course, I don't want to give away her name in this blog ).
Zeno's Paradox
One day mighty Achilles decided to challenge the swiftest tortoise in the land to a race to the ocean and back! In his clemency, Achilles granted the tortoise a head-start of n seconds, so when Achilles started running, given the tortoise ran at a speed of m meters per second, he was already at a distance of m*n meters ahead! It took Achilles only p seconds to travel that distance, but on that time the tortoise had already run p*n meters! Achilles managed to overcome that distance even faster, but then the tortoise were already several nanometers away! At this rate, given that Achilles must first pass an infinite number of points before he can overtake the tortoise, how can he EVER hope to win the race?
I have a little trouble coming up with a sufficient rolution of this problem only because I never really understood wherein the problem lies, and thus what solution would satisfy it. Nevertheless it occurs to me that whenever the tortoise is ahead of Achilles, it will be because he hasn't surpassed the tortoise yet; he is not yet out of the temporal frame of reference wherein the tortoise is ahead, and that will never be subverted no matter how many fractions are added, because the fractions will always be too small to make a difference. Let me demonstrate this with a well known constant: e
In simple terms; e is the sum of the reciprocals of the factorials of all positive integers.
... that didn't turn out very simple, did it?
It's basically just an infinite addition of fractions, each fractions significantly lower than the last:
1 + ( 1/1 ) + ( 1/ ( 1*2 ) ) + ( 1/ ( 1*2*3 ) ) + ( 1/ ( 1*2*3*4 ) ).....
And so on. Essentially you add one more factor to the denominator every time, always divided into 1 and then added to the soup.
There is no limit to how many times you can add into this, and each addition comes closer to e. And yet, we know that e is not only less than 3, it's less than 2.7182818284590452353602877!
It's the same deal with this "paradox"; of course there are infinitely many infinitely fine instances where the tortoise is ahead; that's true for ALL moments! That doesn't mean that in all moments the tortoise is ahead.
Unless Achilles trips and cracks his skull, but as far as I am concerned that is not part of this paradox.
Proof the Easter Bunny Exists
The way I see it, the existence of the Easter Bunny is predicated by the existence of an Existing Easter Bunny. So if we can find an Existing Easter Bunny, then that means the Easter Bunny MUST exist. Flawless reasoning! But doesn't that make the non-existence of the Easter Bunny quite absurd? Because there are exactly two cases; either the Existing Easter Bunny exists or she doesn't exist. But an Existing Easter Bunny that doesn't exist is clearly a logical contradiction! Since there are two cases; that the Easter Bunny exists or she doesn't exist, and as we know the latter to be necessarily false, we can simply deduce that the Easter Bunny MUST exist!So tell me then; what is the difference between an Existing Easter Bunny and an Easter Bunny? That an Existing Easter Bunny exists? How do we know the Easter Bunny exists? We don't!
This is what we in the logic business call "circular reasoning":
If A then A
A
Therefore ASee, there are logical contradictions, meaning every possible conclusion is false, and then there is the exact opposite of that, a tautology, wherein all cases are necessarily true! A tautology is often considered worse than contradictions, because a contradiction at least, we now to be false. A tautology is worse than false, it is unknowable!
As soon as someone proposed the concept of an Existing Easter Bunny, they already accepted the existence of the Easter Bunny; so proving its existence after that is kind of moot.
The Easter Bunny herself have, of course no obligation to exist just because we say so!
Right Triangle Paradox
Compare these triangles. Which one is bigger? Have you discovered they are equally big yet? Well, yeah, they are equally big. But they shouldn't be! Because the lower piece is clearly missing a square! I mean, whoa! Squares disappearing? In perfect geometry? How is that possible!? It can't be possible, but clearly it is!The thing about this paradox is that it is actually two paradoxes in one hoax.
First, that adding a square-unit to an object doesn't change its size, and second that rearranging the components of an object doesn't change its shape. In order to debunk this paradox we need to disprove both.
First things first, does the object actually maintain its size?
But that drives us to the next paradox. If one trianle is bigger, you'd think the components would also be differently sized, but upon examining it I find that not to be the case. So is there a paradox after all?
Wait a minute! Triangles don't have bellies! And look:
That's no triangle! It's an imposter!
And look! It turns out it was Adam from that one episode of Catfish!
In all seriousness, if it doesn't behave like a triangle it is in all likelihood not a triangle. The red and blue shapes were designed to be intercompatible while still appearing as parts of a triangle. If you were to try and do that with the real deals it probably wouldn't turn out that way. In short, it's an optic illusion.
What can I say?
Seeing is not believing. Imperical testing is.
And these are my three paradoxes; all of them resolved!
My friend! There might be moments out there when life seem to consist out of paradoxes. Everything moves too fast, and you feel as if you can't keep up. The paradoxes you face may be much more perplexing than the ones I faced today; but that just makes them more worth solving!
I believe that for all the lies, delusions and empty words circulating across the world, there is still truth and beauty; there is still sanity. And I hope you discover that some day!
Congratulations!
Thursday, 16 October 2014
SOMEONE SOLVED MY BRAIN-TEASER!!!!!
I DID IT!!!
Well, she did it, but it's so fantastic to know that someone actually managed to take their time to solve my ridiculous puzzles! And thought it was worth it!
Or that's what I like to believe...
It was the birthday-child in question, of course! But she didn't post in the comments, so you just need to take my word for it.
To celebrate this momentous occasion I am going to post a good old brain-teaser:
10, 18, 24, 28, ??, 30
Have fun!
Well, she did it, but it's so fantastic to know that someone actually managed to take their time to solve my ridiculous puzzles! And thought it was worth it!
Or that's what I like to believe...
It was the birthday-child in question, of course! But she didn't post in the comments, so you just need to take my word for it.
To celebrate this momentous occasion I am going to post a good old brain-teaser:
10, 18, 24, 28, ??, 30
Have fun!
The Good News, and The Bad News ( feat. brain-teaser )
If you like brain-teasers, the bad news is there is only this one. The good news is that it's a tricky one. If you happen NOT to like brain-teasers, then there are only bad news...
999, 9999, 99000, 989001, 9890001, ???, 989010999
To those of you who happened upon a preview of this teaser, I added an extra instance to make it easier... or harder.
They are both good!
EDIT:
Did I screw up? Yes.
Am I sorry? Yes
Have I fixed it? Yes.
That's three yesses. I am glad we are staying positive at least!
999, 9999, 99000, 989001, 9890001, ???, 989010999
To those of you who happened upon a preview of this teaser, I added an extra instance to make it easier... or harder.
They are both good!
EDIT:
Did I screw up? Yes.
Am I sorry? Yes
Have I fixed it? Yes.
That's three yesses. I am glad we are staying positive at least!
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