T3B39

This is a rather weird riddle:

Once again, I find myself with two persons who don't have anything in common and are, right now, arguing.

"That is not the real diamond I lent you! You thief! Where is it?" the lady shouted, pointing to the small stone on the hand of the man.

"This is the real diamond!" the man objected. "In fact, I have proof!" he added, taking a hammer out of his briefcase. Why he had a hammer in the first place, I didn't want to find out.

Placing the stone on a table, he carefully aimed the hammer at the gem and with one big arc, hit the stone with so much force that the table quivered. The gem remained intact.

"See? It didn't break. Therefore, it is a diamond, which is the hardest mineral on Earth!" he cried triumphantly.

"You have a point," said the woman reluctantly, with a voice sounding of defeat.

Is that her real diamond?

Also, the answer may be obvious with the way this riddle's phrased, but why is it so?

T3B38

Sooo cool:

First, the waiter stuck the match into the lemon wedge, so that it would stand straight. Then he lit the match, and put it in the middle of the plate with the lemon. Then, he placed the glass upside-down over the match. As the flame used up the oxygen in the glass, it created a small vacuum, which sucked in the water through the space between the glass and the plate. Thus, the waiter got the water into the glass without touching or moving the plate.

T3B37

A very sciency riddle:

A man in a restaurant asked a waiter for a juice glass, a dinner plate, water, a match, and a lemon wedge. The man poured enough water onto the plate to cover it.
"If you can get the water on the plate into this glass without touching or moving this plate, I will give you $100," the man said. "You can use the match and lemon to do this."
A few minutes later, the waiter walked away with $100 in his pocket. How did the waiter get the water into the glass?

T3B36

You are! Humans are all primates, remember?

T3B35

You are in a room with 3 monkeys. One monkey has a banana, one has a stick, and one has nothing. Who is the smartest primate?

Riddle. Love. <3

T3B34

The horse operates a mill and travels in a circular clockwise direction. The two outside legs will travel a greater distance than the two inside legs.

T3B33

We love you, math!

A horse travels a certain distance each day. Strangely enough, two of its legs travel 30 miles each day and the other two legs travel nearly 31 miles. It would seem that two of the horse’s legs must be one mile ahead of the other two legs but of course this can’t be true. Since the horse is normal, how is this situation possible?

T3B32

This is how I'm learning the lyrics to Happy. :P

T3B31

The kid filled a glass of water and held it over his head for 10 minutes.

T3B30

Poor magician.

A magician was boasting one day at how long he could hold his breath under water. His record was 6 minutes. A kid listening said, “That’s nothing! I can stay under water for 10 minutes using no types of equipment or air pockets!” The magician told the kid if he could do that, he’d give him $10,000. The kid did it and won the money. Can you figure out how?

T3B29

Ta-da! I've found the TED Talk by Dan Pink on the Candle Problem and motivation.

T3B28

The third and final answer (which is the one I like) is "no".

Supposedly Harvard grads feel like they must have an answer so they're afraid to say "no", but kindergartens have no problem admitting they don't have an answer after thinking for a few minutes. There isn't actually a single thing that connects all of these criteria.

T3B27

The second answer is time.

Polar ears could get white hair when they're old...?

Time could make you cry (something sad happens? Your eyes get dry? :P)

Time makes people have to pee

Time makes people comb their hair (it gets messy)

Time can make celebrities look stupid, in comparison to their younger selves

Time can make regular people look better in comparison to their younger selves, in comparison to the celebrities... (Wait, that didn't really make sense...)

Time will turn pancakes brown, if you leave it on the pan with the heat on

I don't really know how time makes champagne pop

If you squeeze time, I don't know how that would make it pop...

And I guess if you look at the time and realize that you have wasted a lot, I guess you would pop... At least I would :P

T3B26

There are actually a lot of answers to this riddle, that are accepted... But I think there's one that I like a lot because it's pretty funny (not this one)...

Answer 1: pressure

This sort of makes sense: 

Pressure doesn't make polar bears white (well, unless they get really stressed...?)

Pressure could make you cry if you're really stressed

Pressure could make guys have to pee

Pressure could make girls comb their hair (like cliques or peer pressure)

Celebrities might be really nervous and look stupid under pressure

Regular people might shine under pressure

Pancakes could be brown because of pressure.... Okay, maybe not

And champagne doesn't really bubble because of pressure, I don't think... Does walled up CO2 count?

You can't squeeze pressure :(

And you technically can't look at it

Aaahhh, psh, close enough :P

I'll share the second answer tomorrow...

T3B25

Apparently 97% of Harvard grads can't solve this riddle, but 87% of kindergarteners can. :S 

I turn polar bears white

And I will make you cry

I make guys have to pee

I make girls comb their hair

I make celebrities look stupid

I make normal people look like celebrities

I turn pancakes brown

And make your chapagne bubble

If you squeeze me I'll pop

If you look at me you'll pop

What am I?

T3B24

Answer:

A jeweler sells watches and a jailer watches cells. （another bad one... but hey, puns are fun--never mind, bad rhyme :P)

T3B23

What is the difference between a jeweler and a jailer?

T3B22

A palm! (Okay, bad riddle, but whatever *pfffft*)

T3B21

I like this one: What kind of tree is carried in your hand?

T3B20

At first I didn't completely read the Candle Problem too well, so I didn't really focus on affixing the candle to the wall. I thought the thing was to let it not drip on the table, so I was just like, "Why don't you just stick it under the table.... then it won't drip on the table it would drip on the floor...." and then I read the answer and I was like, "Oh." The solution was really smart:

Apparently people fail to realize that the thumbtack box is a candle holder as well as a box for the thumbtacks. Also, I'm not normal because I didn't read the question too well so the reason for my failing apparently had nothing to do with my legit thinking. :S I'm confused now.

I really have to learn more about functional fixedness.

T3B19

Let's look at the Candle Problem like this, how about:

T3B18

I came across a fairly interesting problem today (and it just so happens to work best with a picture! Which makes my superblog for the week! :D).

It's called the Candle Problem, and it is supposedly quite famous, but I haven't heard of it, so maybe I've been living under a rock.... or just not studied psychology/creativity enough.

Here's the problem.

You are given a box of "tacks" (thumbpins, or pins, I supposed we'd call them), a candle, and a book of matches. The table is pushed into the corner of a room.Your task is the affix the lit candle onto the wall in such a way that it does not drip wax onto the table. Using the resources provided, how do you go about doing this?

T3B17

During an interview, the interviewer ordered hot coffee for the candidate to relieve the stress. The coffee was kept before him. After a minute, the interviewer asked him, 'What is before you?' He replied 'Tea'. 

The candidate was selected immediately.

Why?

*Don't take things in their literal meaning, this riddle would be better told orally...

T3B16

The 499th page can be true. It says, "499 pages in this book are false", meaning all the other pages are false and only this one is true.

That's a good one.

T3B15

I'm really bad at these kinds of riddles:

A book has 500 pages:

• The 1st page says "Exactly 1 page in this book is false."
• The 2nd page says "Exactly 2 pages in this book are false."
• ...
• The 500th page says "Exactly 500 pages in this book are false."

Can any of the pages be true?

T3B14

Gr, I can't seem to find the answer to the sudoku....

So, sorry, no answer today.

Oh, I like this one, it tests lateral thinking skills:

A thief enters a shop and threatens the clerk, forcing him to open the safe. The clerk says, "The code for the safe is different every day, and if you hurt me you'll never get the code". But the thief manages to guess the code on his own.

How did he do it?

T3B13

Answer to T3B12 coming tomorrow...

I've taken up a new hobby: sudoku. I used to hate it because I was SERIOUSLY bad at it (like, seriously bad). I'd get to a point where I'd have like two left in a row/column/square and I'd guess maybe one so I could keep moving, get to the end of the sudoku, and realize that I have two 5's somewhere or something. And I wouldn't know where I screwed up or guessed, and I'd be like RRRAAAGGEEEE SPASM *ERASES ENTIRE GRID* *STARTS CRYING.... :'(* But then I figured out this awesome strategy where you write all the possible combinations in mini numbers above the grid, and it worked out fine-ish....

But recently, my aunt told me that she was hooked and that I should try it because it improves you detail-noticing-skills, but I gave her the rant about me being superbad at sudoku, and then I did a really easy one on her phone, and I remembered that I actually liked doing math/problems when I wasn't raging at them :).

So ta-da! Sudoku today! (Maybe I'm just really random and crazy sometimes....)

http://www.websudoku.com/?level=1&set_id=8504163176 <- this is the link to the online sudoku

WHOO! Ta-da! Instant paste sudoku grid! mwahahaha!

(Dang, I can actually write in this? This website is good.... THANK YOU SO MUCH, WEBSUDOKU!)

T3B12

I WANT A PALACE LIKE THAT, I WANT ONE I WANT ONE I WANT ONE..... :P

It's soooo pretty but I bet it would be pretty cold.... and I'm sorry, unlike Elsa, the cold always bothered me...

Seriously, it'd be so cool to live in a huge palace, all made of ice... and it would be really pretty too, with the ice made into all sorts of shapes. Although maybe a palace of chocolate would be better.... ;) You could eat all of it!

I suppose someone who does live in such a palace would get pretty tired of seeing and eating chocolate. 

How about a random riddle?

I actually really like this one because it is a complicated version of another riddle:

There is a strange island in the South Pacific called Haircut Island. The law on this island states that you cannot cut your own hair and you must get your hair cut once a week. There are no mirrors and only two barbers on Haircut Island. These two barbers are identical twins. One barber can't cut hair very well, but his brother rules. The locals refuse to tell you which of the barbers is the good haircutter. You need a haircutter really badly! How do you know which barber to pick for the good haircut? 

T3B11

The answer to T3B9:

Pour the lentils into the innkeeper's sack, bind it and turn inside out. Pour in the peas. Then unbind the sack a pour the lentils back to your sack.

T3B10

Answer to T3B7:

The coins were fake. BC stands for Before Christ, so how could people know it was 400 years before Christ was born? The dating system of BC and AD arose some years after Christ's birth. (oh look! geeky fact!)

Answer to T3B8:

I don't really understand this, now that I read it more carefully...

The back prisoner will yell "black" if there is an odd number of black hats in front of him and "white" if there is an even number of black hats in front of him. The next prisoner will then count the number of black hats in front of him and if it was odd and is now even, or vice versa, then that person knows what color their hat is. The next person then knows their hat color based on what the people before them said and how many black hats are in front of them. In this way the front 99 prisoners will know their hat color and will be set free. The prisoner in the back who goes first has a 50 percent chance of being set free.

I just realized, what if you have, say 98 black hats in front of you and 1 white? And you have a black hat? Then you'd have to say "white" but you'd go to jail! And if the next person saw 97 black hats and 1 white, then he'd know he was a black hat. But he'd say "black" because... oh, I get it now.

Okay wait, what if you see 97 black hats and 2 white ones? You have a white hat, and you say "black". You go to jail. The next person sees 96 black hats and 2 white ones. He has a black hat. He says "white" and also goes to jail! The next person sees, say, 96 black hats and 1 white one. He says, "white". The next person sees 95 black hats and 1 white one. He says, "black".

Then you can only save 98!

Or if you have the same circumstances, but the second person sees 97 black hats and 1 white one? He has a white one, but has to say "black". The next person person sees 97 black hats and no white ones. He says "black" but knows he's white, and he has to go to jail! The next person sees 96 black hats and no white ones. "White", but he's wrong! This way, less than 50 people will be saved, because each person will have to alert the person in front of them and it will alternate--white, black, white, black. But they're all black....

I'm very confused now. Even after this long and crazy rant about this riddle. :(

I'll post the answer to T3B9 tomorrow... leave some more time to think... :P

T3B9

Answer to T3B7 and T3B8 will be posted tomorrow...

How about another riddle? 

A poor farmer went to the market to sell some peas and lentils. However, as he had only one sack and didn't want to mix peas and lentils, he poured in the peas first, tied the sack in the middle, and then filled the top portion of the sack with the lentils. At the market a rich innkeeper happened by with his own sack. He wanted to buy the peas, but he did not want the lentils.
Pouring the seed anywhere else but the sacks is considered soiling. Trading sacks is not allowed. The farmer can't cut a hole in his sack.
How would you transfer the peas to the innkeeper's sack, which he wants to keep, without soiling the produce?

I really like this one, because it requires creative thinking. Also, this would be a good thing to apply in real life (not with peas and lentils, but it is a good problem).