A Real Conundrum
The bizarre story of the Scottish programmer found dead in his car half a mile away from a box of deadly snakes reads like one of those conundrums popular with secondary school science teachers (in my case Mr Mainwaring, Physics). Here are a few ones I remember:
- A man was found dead in the bottom of a phone box. The only things with him in the phone box (apart from the phone) were a fishing rod and some broken glass. How did he die?
- Every day a man leaves his apartment on the 46th floor and rides the lift down to the first floor to go to work. Every evening at about 6 pm he gets in the lift, takes the lift up to the 38th floor, gets out and walks up the stairs the for the remaing eight floors until he reaches the 46th floor. Why?
- Two people were born within minutes of each other by the same mother, but they weren’t twins. How is this possible?
11:31 am on 23 May 2004 :::
Tommy Says:1. Don\’t underestimate the fun and danger that can be had with a fishing rod and a bottle of beer in a phone booth.
2. The lift breaks down at 6:02 pm, regular as clockwork.
3. Time travel.
Yes, I know. I\’m rubbish.
8:12 pm on 24 May 2004 :::
Phil Says:2. The guy is a bit short and can only reach the 38th button on the keypad.
Not sure about 1 or 3…
8:52 pm on 24 May 2004 :::
Matt Says:Aye that\’s the one Phil.
The problem with these conundrums is that they rely on other information that\’s only given when questions about them are answered, otherwise any answer will do (as Tommy has demonstrated
Here are the \’official\’ answers:
1. The guy was a fisherman who was describing the size of a catch to friend on the phone. But stupidly, he gesticulated the size of the fish and put his hands through the glass either side of the phone box, and bled to death (see what I mean?)
3. Another baby was born a few minutes later, they were triplets.