Part I:
1. There are 64 checkers players at a tournament. A player is eliminated when he or she loses a game. How many games must the champion play?
Response: 6 (64 players/2 players per game =32 players left/2= 16/2= 8/2= 4/2= 2, CHAMPION GAME)
2. The electricity goes out, and your bedroom is pitch dark. Yet you still need to find a matching pair of socks! In your drawer are 25 white socks and 25 red socks. How many socks must you take out of the drawer before you get a matching pair?
Response: three (think about it!)
3. If you have two U.S. coins totaling 55 cents and one of the coins is not a nickel, what are the two coins?
Response: a 50 cent piece and a nickel (one is a nickel --but one is not a nickel)
4. If three cats kill three rats in three minutes, how long will it take for 100 cats to kill 100 cats?
Response: three minutes (more cats and more rats don't equal more time)
5. A farmer had 17 chickens. All but 9 died. How many does the farmer have left?
Response: Nine (read the question again --and this time, pay attention!)
6. Is it legal in Canada for a man to marry his widow's sister?
Response: no (he's dead)
7. Change
8. Three men are walking in the rain with no umbrellas and no hats. Two get their hair wet and one doesn't. Why?
Response: the third man is bald
9. A girl went door-to-door selling eggs. At the first house, she sold half her eggs plus half an egg. At the second house, she sold half her eggs plus half an egg. At the third house, she sold half her eggs plus half an egg. After this she had no eggs left --she had sold all her eggs. How many did she start with?
Response: Seven (FIRST HOUSE: half of 7= 3.5 + .5 egg= 4 eggs sold. 3 remaining; SECOND HOUSE: half of 3= 1.5, +.5 eggs= 2 eggs sold, 1 remaining; THIRD HOUSE: half of 1= .5, +.5 egg= 1 egg sold, 0 remaining)
10. You have a 9-gallon container and a 4-gallon container. How can you measure out exactly 6-gallons of water from a tank without using any other container?
Response: Turn the 4-gallon container into a container that will measure out 3 gallons by filling it with one gallon of water. You can get one gallon of water by filling the 9-gallon container and emptying 4 gallons into the 4-gallon container. Now the 9-gallon in it (9 - 4 =5). Empty the 4-gallon container and fill it again from the 9-gallon container. Now the 9-gallon container has 1 gallon (5-4=1). Empty the 4-gallon container again and put the 1 gallon of water in it. Now it will take 3 gallons of water to fill the 4-gallon container. Fill the 9-gallon contianer and dump enough water from it to fill the 4-gallon container the rest of the way. Nine gallons minus 3 gallons leaves 6 gallons in the 9-gallon container!
Part II:
1. T or F: If penicillin cures an infection, then the lack of penicillin in the bloodstream must cause the infection
Response: False. You can't assume that the reverse of something is true. Although this works in some cases (sleep cures tiredness, lack of sleep causes tiredness), obviously we can't say things like, "Since aspirin relieves headaches, lack of aspirin must cause headaches."
2. T or F: Tim and Tom play the lottery. Tim picks numbers 9, 17, 22, 48, 6, 10. Tom picks numbers 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, and 1 4. Tim has a better chance of winning than Tom.
Response: False. When choosing six numbers out of 40 chances for a lottery, any combination is as likely to come up as any other combination. Just because the numbers are in sequence doesn't decrease their likelihood of coming up.
3. T or F: Since nobody seems to be able to prove that Sana Claus does not exist, it's reasonable to assume that he likely doesn't exist.
Response: False. Disproving the existence of something is very difficult. But just because you can't disprove the existence of something doesn't mean its existence is therefore proven! Maybe this fact of logic is why our legal system says that person is innocent until proven guilty. When charged with a crime, you don't have to prove that you didn't do it. Rather, it must be proved that you did do it.
4. T or F: If statistics show that ice cream sales go up with the number of house infants spend fussing, this means that fussy infants cause people to go out and buy ice cream.
Response: False. Fussy babies and ice cream sales are both caused by 100 degree temperatures and uncomfortable weather conditions.
5. T or F: If a study shows that children who spend their preschool years in a day-care center are more likely to finish college than children who are cared for at home, we can assume that day-care centers educate children better than parents at
Response: False. This information actually tells us nothing -or, rather, we can't way what it does tell us. It may be that day-care facilities are teaching children more, or it may be that children in day care have two working parents who can afford to send them to college in later years. Too often, a little information is interpreted mean a lot more than it does!
Part III:
1. A penny doubled every day would give you, at the end of 30 days...$10,000,000. To be exact, you'd have $10,737,418.24! So who said pennies were worthless?
2. How many times will you need to shuffle a deck of cards to make sure the deck is mixed up?...6-8 times. If you shuffle only a couple of times, a magician who knows the original order of the deck will usually be able to find a card that you remove and replace. (Much of what looks like "magic" is just skillful entertainment).
3. Two people are picked at random from the population of the United States. What are the chances that Person One will know someone who knows someone who knows Person Two?...almost certain (99/100). The chances are almost certain.
4. Four people are meeting for the first time. Two of them have the same astrological sign. Two of them have the same astrological sign. How do you feel about this?...unimpressed (this is expected). At least two will have the same sign four times out of ten.
5. You want to buy a new computer. In January, it goes on sale for 40% off. But you still can't afford it. Then, in March, it's reduced by the 40% more! You go buy it, knowing you'll save this much off the original price...64%. First you save 40%, which leaves 60%. Then you save 40% of the remaining 60%, or 24%. 40%+24%= 64%.
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