Comments on: Brain teaser

By: Waverly

Waverly — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 16:44:04 +0000

I thought the statement “The Norwegian lives in the first house,” was rather ambiguous. Is that the first house on the left or the first house on the right?

By: jGarrido

jGarrido — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 01:05:59 +0000

I think I’ve just been burned one too many times to be able to agree to make that assumption; the wording of the question is just a bit too ambiguous the way it stands. Had the author of the puzzle wanted to leave no doubt, they would have worded it with more clarity – by stating the remaining pet was a fish and asking who owned it; or by listing every nationality, drink, sport, and pet individually before getting into the known associations.

By: Rik Hemsley

Rik Hemsley — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 00:54:52 +0000

The pet is named so that you have something to write in the empty space in the grid you will likely create. Or just to spare us the terrible sense of incompleteness that may be felt with the final pet’s species left unresolved.

I think it’s fair to distribute the information needed to answer the question throughout the text of the question.

By: jGarrido

jGarrido — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 00:47:48 +0000

But then why bother naming the pet at all? Why not just ask who owned the remaining ‘unmentioned’ pet? It can’t be assumed that the question contains any relevant information.

By: Rik Hemsley

Rik Hemsley — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 00:42:59 +0000

If you study the question carefully, you should see that the final sentence reads ‘Who owns the fish?’

This question gives you the information that the final and, indeed, most important pet is a fish.

So I’m not saying that _every_ question has an answer that can be found following deductive reasoning. Only that this one can – by reading the question.

By: jgarrido

jgarrido — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 00:31:35 +0000

Rik, following that logic, that’s kind of like saying every question has an answer that can be found following deductive reasoning. However, none of the known facts even came close to implying ownership, by anyone, of a fish. And process of elimination can only be used with facts.

The question cannot create its own answer.

By: Rik Hemsley

Rik Hemsley — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 00:17:00 +0000

Shraddhan, JGarrido:

The fact that someone keeps a fish is implied in the text of the question.

By: JGarrido

JGarrido — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 23:03:14 +0000

I read through the list and, assuming it was a trick question (e.g. What color was George Washington’s white horse?), came to the same conclusion as Shraddhan.

By: havstein

havstein — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 23:53:44 +0000

Enjoyable brain teaser, but the clarification regarding wether the green house is to the immediate left of the white actually gave me another clue, and after I realized that it only took me a couple of minutes to finish the puzzle.

By: Shraddhan

Shraddhan — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 06:04:35 +0000

I cracked it in 5 seconds. It is insoluble. There is no evidence that anybody keeps a fish.

Maybe the fifth pet is a hamster, a goat, unicorn…

Perhaps I should assume that there is indeed a fish. That would make it more interesting. :-)