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.
An explorer goes on an exposition in the jungle. He sets up camp in the middle of the jungle. The next morning he sees something with a head and a tail, but he is not afraid. What did he see in his bag?
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.