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Lateral Thinking Puzzles
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Barry Grant
Barry Grant
Old Shoe

Sep-10-2006 18:25

Due to the success of the lateral puzzles in the "A riddle" thread, it seems appropriate to start a lateral thinking puzzle thread.

A rule of thumb to follow would be to allow those who do not know the answer to figure it out for themselves. If you happen to know the answer, please keep it to yourself and let the others have the fun.

Please feel free to start one at any point. It is not necessary to wait for one to finish before starting another one.

Have fun!

Replies

Zeehawk
Zeehawk

May-2-2007 18:36

matteo got it and i thought that was gonna be kinda hard but it wasnt

crunchpatty
crunchpatty
Old Shoe

May-10-2007 01:49

bumping it for Det. Abby, and a little bit for Mizz Helen too :)

Titus04
Titus04

May-30-2007 21:39

A teacher was trying to explain to the class multiplication tables and asks "What is three times five?" A student responds "F!". The teacher tells the student that was incorrect as all answers should be numbers. The student persists and explains it. How can the student be correct?


Cordelia Falco
Cordelia Falco
Battered Shoe

Jun-1-2007 10:58

Base sixteen? (dim and distant memories of watching programs load on a BBC micro)

Titus04
Titus04

Jun-1-2007 19:24

Yeah that's right. I figured that would have been hard. ;)

Cordelia Falco
Cordelia Falco
Battered Shoe

Jun-2-2007 05:44

Sorry, you hit my geek button!

biggie528
biggie528
Lucky Stiff

Jun-2-2007 07:19

Want to explain it to us non-BBC watchers? What the hell is base 16? :)

Loretta Devine
Loretta Devine
Well-Connected

Jun-2-2007 09:16

Um. It's a maths thing that I'm now going to completely fail to explain comprehensibly... like binary is base 2?

In base ten the number 10 means you've got one lot of ten and zero lots of ones. In base two the number 10 means you've got 1 lot of two and zero lots of ones. You can have any base you want. In base eight, for example, the number 11 would mean you had one lot of eight and one lot of one, so 11 in base eight is what we usually think of as nine.

In base sixteen 10 means sixteen, so you need extra characters to get you there. So you count 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,A,B,C,D,E,F,10.

Many many moons ago we had an early home computer called a BBC micro, which you connected to a cassette player if you wanted to load programs. While the program was loading it counted up in base sixteen to let you know how much it had loaded, so you could sit there wondering why it was going from 19 to 1A to 1B etc. It was like watching paint dry and being in a maths class at the same time.

I am now going to bash my head against a wall and pretend I have a life :)

Loretta Devine
Loretta Devine
Well-Connected

Jun-2-2007 09:18

Drat, I'm suffering from identity problems again. This is Cordy in disguise.

shell marple
shell marple
Con Artist

Mar-22-2010 14:38

This puzzle is slightly different - it is a cross between an adventure and a lateral puzzle.

I expect you to place yourself into Inspector Millet's shoes, and interrogate the three people present in your office (you may ask your subordinate Constable Spike as well) about the case. I am afraid your clever minds would solve the puzzle in no time if you were allowed a classical interrogation with questions like "What did you do yesterday afternoon“, so please ask Yes/No questions as you are used to. Sometimes, however, the interrogated people can be more talkative than that.

In this particular case, I can promise none of the persons involved will be outright lying, but please bear in mind that each of them has his/her own point of view, which may be biased and/or exaggerated, and that they do not necessarily know all the circumstances of the case.


Ready? So off we go:

A sobbing woman with a black eye bursts into your office. She is very upset, and the only thing you are able to make out among her sobs is that her name is Mrs Smith, she lives in a nearby village, and she was coming to report a rape.

As you are trying to calm her down, the telephone on your desk rings. You pick it up, and hear Jimmy Spike's voice: "I’ve just been called to a fight of two men. A certain Mr Smith and Mr Brown. None of them is severely injured, but especially Mr Smith is very violent and needs to be calmed down."

"Bring them over to my office, Constable", you sigh resignedly. "Seems this is going to be another long day," you say to yourself as you are putting down the receiver.

Go ahead and enjoy!

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