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Ok, my prof is at it again. This time it's an impossible math riddle problem... (1 Viewer)

Wayne Bundrick

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No, no, no, I have to defend Jane here.

She couldn't count all those playing kids (perhaps some were at the back of the house). Again we have a clue here: otherwise the friend wouldn't have felt a need to say that she couldn't form a baseball team with them.
Okay, I'll buy that. Jane's friend wouldn't have had to say there weren't enough to play baseball if Jane could see that for herself.

With this logic the answer must be 2,3,4,5. It is the only combination that makes 120 with the smallest number being 2. If the smallest number was 1 then Jane would need more information because there are two such combinations that make 120.

But I still think Jane should have already known how many kids her friend had, and since each of the three combinations making 120 has a different largest number, she wouldn't have needed to ask anything to figure it out.
 

Jonny K

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Guys! Let it go already! :-P

I'll let ya know if the prof accepts the answer in a few days.


Jonny K.
 

Sebastian

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The product of the numbers is my house number
Everyones house number is even or odd depending on what side of the St. you live on.
It is in the riddle that she has an actual house number and every residence I have been to has a house number, example 120 S Primrose Lane or 105 E Main St.


Still confused?
 

Jonny K

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OK everybody! Here's my prof's e-mail response:

"Right on!"

:D :emoji_thumbsup:


Thanks for the help. And hey, it's not a crime to discuss a math problem with friends, is it?


Jonny K. ;)
 

Mark Zimmer

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If that's the case then either the original post is misquoting the problem, or the prof is out to lunch. What's with the "not enough people" to play baseball when you mean "not enough children"? Not the same thing at all.
 

Paul Bond

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To Mark Z.

While I agree that the statement "not enough children to play baseball" might have been more accurate, my take on it is that the whole conversation was about the children in the front yard. There was no mention of parents, step-parents, single parents, or multi-colored parrots (oops wrong post). As such, I never even considered the number of parents when figuring out the answer.

Just pointing out my personal whyfore and therethree.

Paul
 

Joseph DeMartino

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What's with the "not enough people" to play baseball when you mean "not enough children"?
I agree with Paul Bond, since we're not given any information about the number of adults who may or may not be present, it is clear that they must be left out of the calculation. (You cannot just assume two parents per child, or assume that every parent attended, etc.) So this is a minor point, at worst. I considered and rejected it as a factor in the solution right away.

Regards,

Joe
 

Leila Dougan

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or assume that every parent attended
"and Jane then responds by telling her the number of people in each family. "

Why, then, does the correct answer assume she means people in each family that was present. When I include one parent in each family (the sister, the brother, the cousin, the friend), it is not because I'm assuming they are present. By definition, if it is their family, they are the parent. I'm not assuming any spouses or such, just going by what was given.

So, then, it stands to reason that you MUST include the said parent if you're counting "people in each family".
 

TimDoss

Second Unit
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Poor choice of wording on the professor's part.
The problem pertains to the number of children only,
not any parent, divorced, step, dead, present or otherwise.
 

BrianW

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If you include parents and assume two parents in each family, then you can't have fewer than 18 people. So even it it is poorly worded (and it might simply be a trap), this fact alone should be enough to eliminate parents from the count.

[Edit: I'm not the first one to point this out.]
 

TimDoss

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Maybe this will help, this is how I've seen the problem presented before... the professor excluded the house number
to presumably make it somewhat more difficult.

We are led to believe that this Jane person is some kind of
math wiz... nothing tells us that she is able to count running
children on the fly or that she knows this person well enough to know how many children she has. Screw Jane and all
the complications she adds to the problem. Unless she's some half naked hottie I would prefer to just forget the bitch.


Smith has a number of children.
Brown has a smaller number of children.
Green has an even smaller number of children.
Black has the smallest number of children.
The total number of children is less than 18.
The product of the numbers of children is 120, the same as the
house number of Mr. Smith's House.
I asked Mr. Smith, "Is there more than 1 child in the Black family?"
When he answered, since I knew the house number, I also knew
the number of children in each family.

How many children in each family?
 

Morgan Jolley

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Regardless of the assumptions we are able to make, the problem is still worded badly with the phrase "not enough people to play baseball." It should have said children.
 

Jonny K

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Yeah, there are WAY too many cases when I'm in a test and reading the question I find it's poorly worded. Drives me NUTS.


Jonny K.
 

Morgan Jolley

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What pisses me off more than that is when practice tests have poorly worded questions. It makes it harder to understand how the actual test will work.

For example, we recently took the HSPA (High School Proficiency Assessment) and the practice test for it was much harder than the real test because of horribly worded questions.
 

Cees Alons

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....
The total number of children is less than 18.
The product of the numbers of children is 120, the same as the
house number of Mr. Smith's House.
....
No, I resent that. It's mandatory that the housenumber is not given. That's part of the essence of the problem. Knowing the housenumber is too much information for us.

Cees
 

BrianW

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It's mandatory that the housenumber is not given.
I must agree. What could possibly be the reason for pointing out that the product of the numbers is equal to Mr. Smith's house number if the value of 120 is simply volunteered in the first place? I believe this is an obvious rewording of the original problem with the value of 120 summarily inserted simply to appease the sensibilities of those who couldn’t understand how the nature of the question leads to a logical determination of the product, and took it upon themselves to “correct” the problem before retelling it to others. The second version of the problem even includes the “since I knew the house number” quote, betraying the fact that the exploitable nature of the problem solver’s knowledge, without actually knowing what he knows, is completely lost on the author (or reviser) of the second version of the problem.
 

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