The Essential Magic Conference has now uploaded all of the videos from all of the sessions, and you can watch them for just $75. It’s a bargain, go for it! OK, to the puzzle…..
Yesterday I saw a drinks machine that had three selections – Tea, Coffee or Random (Tea or Coffee). However, the machine was wired up wrongly so that each button does not give what it claims. If each drink costs 50p, what is the minimum that you have to put into the machine to work out which button gives which selection?
As ever, please do NOT post your answers, but do say whether you have solved it and how long it took.
See you Monday!
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July 30, 2010 at 5:36 am |
As worded, the solution took me only a moment to work out. I think the question may be misworded.
July 30, 2010 at 5:55 am
I think it is worded correctly, otherwise I don’t think there is an answer (assuming we are talking about the same thing).
July 30, 2010 at 10:50 am
Is worded correctly.
July 30, 2010 at 5:55 am |
Took only a few moments to figure it out
July 30, 2010 at 5:56 am |
Solved it in 10 seconds
July 30, 2010 at 5:57 am |
I think the question may be misworded too, but either way it’s an easy one.
July 30, 2010 at 6:00 am
…then again worded the other way (maximum vs. minimum) it’s the same answer!
July 30, 2010 at 7:40 am
I don’t see how maximum could be the same unless the “random” button is just alternating between coffee and tea rather than truly random.
July 30, 2010 at 1:52 pm
I think you’re right Tommy, it would take at least one additional press?
July 31, 2010 at 9:34 am
The puzzle is worded correctly. And the random button is just alternating between coffee and tea, that is what it says. The word “minimum” is correct. You can always put more money in it, but it should not be neccesary if you do it the right way.
We have had a puzzle like this one before. So it was very easy.
July 30, 2010 at 5:59 am |
Took me a minute (it’s late/early), but I got there.
July 30, 2010 at 6:06 am |
Done while reading. It’s another guise of the old apples and oranges puzzle.
July 30, 2010 at 11:22 pm
2nd that, exactly the same puzzel in a different context. C’mon Richard, you’re better than that.
July 31, 2010 at 9:34 am
Agree…
July 30, 2010 at 6:07 am |
Yeah, just a slight rehash of the apple and orange one from a couple months ago. Yawn.
July 30, 2010 at 6:12 am |
This has been done before but with a different form of food.
July 30, 2010 at 6:13 am
Delay the comment by 5 minutes, and all the subtlety is gone.
July 30, 2010 at 6:15 am |
Why would it have a random button?
It took me ’til the end of the question for the reasons stated above.
July 30, 2010 at 6:32 am |
I think that I have worked-out the correct answer. I spent 20 seconds arriving at it, and a further 60+ seconds to determine if it could be as simple as it seems to be!
I’ll see on Tuesday. (We are all time-lords in Australia)
July 30, 2010 at 6:36 am |
wooo hoo. i can actually do this one! i know dead easy but it made me feel smart achieving one
July 30, 2010 at 6:47 am |
Yep. Got it. And, as I HATE coffee, I also know the maximum I would need to put in to be sure of getting a cup of tea.
July 30, 2010 at 12:22 pm
LOL, That was the same that I was wondering too!
July 30, 2010 at 6:51 am |
About a minute
July 30, 2010 at 6:57 am |
This is way to easy
July 30, 2010 at 7:02 am |
Maybe… just maybe make me feel better after last week’s but really way too easy if I did this right ….. just until the end of reading the question and a minute to work it out….humm….yep I feel good……. :}
July 30, 2010 at 10:49 am
Lila, didn’t we solve a problem like this not so long ago, here?
July 30, 2010 at 11:24 am
Joao Pedro, sort of ….. I think we had oranges and apples? And one mixed and we needed to fix the labels that were all wrong and we could only look inside one box to set them right?……apple & oranges…….coffee & tea…..hmmmm…..
July 30, 2010 at 7:09 am |
Oh I’m too tired this week to hunt for my lost brain… I could have worked this out at primary school in a second. Suddenly I am old and redundant.
July 30, 2010 at 7:20 am |
Solved it in a minute. I like this one.
July 30, 2010 at 7:45 am |
It took me two minutes to realise my 1st answer, arrived at in 2 seconds, was wrong then another 2 minutes to get the ‘right’ answer
July 30, 2010 at 7:48 am |
2 or 3 minutes, as I initially started off on the wrong track. If it *is* a rehash then I’ve forgotten the older one so it made me feel good to work it out!
July 30, 2010 at 7:54 am |
Less than a minute to get the answer and check it through. Had to check as the wording of the question is right but could be misinterpreted.
This isn’t one of the best Friday Puzzles there’s ever been.
July 30, 2010 at 8:05 am |
Nice, Back to the easy puzzles. About half minute.
July 30, 2010 at 8:06 am |
Thank you. Solved in a flash. This made me feel clever
July 30, 2010 at 8:29 am |
Got it. Had to do some extra thinking to get to the best solution, but it was still a fairly easy puzzle.
July 30, 2010 at 8:36 am |
The time to read it (I just knew the riddle)..
July 30, 2010 at 8:46 am |
About 5 seconds, provided I understood the question.
July 30, 2010 at 8:57 am |
I figured it was a rehashing of the old apples and oranges puzzle but took me a couple of minutes to just reveiew it and come up with my answer.
July 30, 2010 at 10:06 am |
Solved.
About 10 seconds.
July 30, 2010 at 10:08 am |
Easy, 10 seconds.
July 30, 2010 at 10:24 am |
Thought i had in 5 secs, but reviewing got me the correct answer a minute later.
July 30, 2010 at 10:29 am |
It took me about half an hour, but only thirty seconds of that was after reading the question properly and spotting the key info (the bit that Beranger points out). D’oh.
July 30, 2010 at 10:32 am |
p.s. if the question isn’t worded wrongly, then it’s worded clumsily. I think we’re presumably looking for the smallest maximum amount that you’d have to spend in order to be 100% sure in all cases.
July 30, 2010 at 10:38 am |
Ah yes very simple. The case is far more interesting if the buttons aren’t labeled at all…
July 30, 2010 at 10:43 am |
nice one, few seconds.
This seems a good puzzle for non-puzzlers.
July 30, 2010 at 10:48 am |
Beranger, considering that you must have read all the puzzle text, did you read the part where it says: “As ever, please do NOT post your answers,”?
July 30, 2010 at 11:45 am |
Now, now Joao Pedro you know that doesn’t apply to EVERYBODY……oh hmm no sorry I’m wrong….THAT DOES APPLY TO EVERYBODY…..was that what you were thinking too?
July 30, 2010 at 10:15 pm
I think our replies became orphans :-p
This is instructive but weird at the same time: who will guess what happened? Our comments here now doesn’t appear to make any sense. Answers to questions forgotten… maybe many of the weird comments and historical mysteries I see sometimes are reactions to disappeared pieces, wise guys becoming loonies.
August 2, 2010 at 7:32 am
oops! Joao Pedro me thinks Richard took down the post that gave the answer…..looking back my post looks mean…..I meant it to be funny sort of a poke as not to give the answer away…..sorry if offended anyone… :{ ….. I will be better….. :} …..
July 30, 2010 at 11:50 am |
Think I solved it, very quickly!
July 30, 2010 at 12:10 pm |
[...] Wiseman has a nice retelling of the apples-and-oranges puzzle (which incidentally was a regular interview question at a company I used to work for): Yesterday I [...]
July 30, 2010 at 12:34 pm |
2 seconds to get a gut answer, and then another minute to convince myself that it was right.
July 30, 2010 at 12:43 pm |
Is this any different than the Apples/Oranges/Both question a few weeks ago?
July 30, 2010 at 1:10 pm
To me also it looks the same puzzle, just worded differently, about wrongly labelled boxes of ‘apples and oranges’ published on March 26, 2010.
July 30, 2010 at 1:17 pm
For me, due to the different wording, this one was much easier to imagine. That made solving it much easier (I didn’t even start on the other one, while this one only took me a few minutes).
July 30, 2010 at 1:10 pm |
Thirty seconds – as long as the answer begins with same letter as the capital of Sierra Leone
July 30, 2010 at 1:30 pm |
It took me about 20 seconds to figure out the key insight, and a further three minutes or so to work the details out on paper to my satisfaction.
July 30, 2010 at 2:30 pm |
2 min
July 30, 2010 at 2:37 pm |
Less than 1 minute. This problem works pretty like a scientific model. Am I right?
July 30, 2010 at 2:45 pm
Just found my solution was wrong.
July 30, 2010 at 2:41 pm |
Solved it in a minute or so. Very similar to a past puzzle. Write out the possibilities and see which ones you can eliminate and why.
July 30, 2010 at 3:08 pm |
I think that i got it…
July 30, 2010 at 8:39 pm |
I thought I had the right answer a few times, but after rereading the puzzle twice (apparently, I skimmed the wording and missed a few details each time), I’ve solved it in ten minutes.
July 30, 2010 at 9:15 pm |
I did not know this puzzle. I found it too difficult to solve by myself. Reading all these remarks about apples and ornages made me google ‘oranges apples random puzzle’ so I read the solution elsewhere.
July 30, 2010 at 9:19 pm |
Good one, 5 minutes. Read the question carefully.
July 31, 2010 at 12:13 am |
[...] It’s the Friday Puzzle! The Essential Magic Conference has now uploaded all of the videos from all of the sessions, and you can watch them for [...] [...]
July 31, 2010 at 3:39 am |
Love it, at first I thought it was something that it turned out not to be .. then after 3 minutes I had an “ahh Ha” moment and got it a minute later.
…or so I think … good one Thanks
July 31, 2010 at 11:06 am |
Solved it in about fifteen seconds.
It’s similar in many ways to that old puzzler where linked classes of content are printed on opposite sides of a certain number of cards, and the question is how many cards you need to flip over to prove/disprove the ostensible rule.
July 31, 2010 at 11:59 am |
Fantastic A-ha moment!
July 31, 2010 at 4:04 pm |
confused at first thinking a random button could produce tea endlessly therefore would be indistinguishable from tea button. Then I read the question again.
July 31, 2010 at 6:26 pm |
First: Me like tea.
Second: this one was easy…
July 31, 2010 at 10:57 pm |
2 seconds, I thought too many in the first second, and brought it down to the right number in the next second.
August 1, 2010 at 12:35 am |
I started writing it out, but then it just came to me. I’m pretty confident I got the right answer. These are my favorite kinds of puzzles. Feel free to post as many of them as you like, Richard.
August 1, 2010 at 10:53 am |
10s after re-reading the question /exactly/
August 1, 2010 at 11:18 am |
it took a couple of minutes to convince myself of my answer and now I satisfied
August 1, 2010 at 11:21 am |
what puzzles me most is the order in which the comments are post if the timestamps are correct…
August 1, 2010 at 7:19 pm |
10 sec for the A-Ha!
3 min to expain it in words
August 1, 2010 at 7:22 pm |
10 sec for the ‘A-Ha! moment’
3 min to expain it in words
August 1, 2010 at 10:21 pm |
I spent half a minute thinking I knew the answer, and that it seemed a bit strange. And then I re-read the question and noticed the vital bit, after which the answer was clear, and not so strange.
August 2, 2010 at 1:00 am |
It took about a minute to figure the minimum price, but I had to draw a picture first.
August 2, 2010 at 7:58 am |
To give to understand we know the answer without playing the answer, is an art and a game. I expect to see Beranger next time, more subtle.
August 3, 2010 at 2:03 pm |
finally one my brain can capture. one minute
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