There is a box in which distinct numbered balls have been kept. You have to pick two balls randomly from the lot.
If someone is offering you a 2 to 1 odds that the numbers will be relatively prime, for example
If the balls you picked had the numbers 6 and 13, you lose $1.
If the balls you picked had the numbers 5 and 25, you win $2.
A man was going to bleach his socks because they had gotten muddy the day before. As he was pouring the bleach into the washing machine, he spilt some on the floor. He got some cleaning fluid and mopped it up with a rag. Minutes later he was dead. What killed him?
A man had five children. He had $100 with him to give to his children. He decided to start with the youngest child and then give $2 more than each younger child to his next elder child.
For example, if he gives $x to the youngest child, he will give $(x+2) to the next one, $[(x+2) + 2] to the next one and so on.
Can you find out how much did the youngest one receive?
You have two strings whose only known property is that when you light one end of either string it takes exactly one hour to burn. The rate at which the strings will burn is completely random and each string is different.
There is a shop where written:
Buy 1 for $1
10 for $2
100 for $3
I needed 999 and still only paid $3. How could this be financially viable for the shop-keeper?
In 2011, people playing Foldit, an online puzzle game about protein folding, resolved the structure of an enzyme that causes an Aids-like disease in monkeys. Researchers had been working on the problem for 13 years. The gamers solved it in three weeks.
