When Jack was six years old he hammered a nail into his favourite tree to mark his height. Ten years later at age sixteen, Jack returned to see how much higher the nail was. If the tree grew by five centimetres each year, how much higher would the nail be?
This is a famous paradox which has caused a great deal of argument and disbelief from many who cannot accept the correct answer. Four balls are placed in a hat. One is white, one is blue and the other two are red. The bag is shaken and someone draws two balls from the hat. He looks at the two balls and announces that at least one of them is red. What are the chances that the other ball he has drawn out is also red?
A man has a barrel filled with oil that weighs 100 pounds, and then he puts something into it. Now the barrel weighs less than 100 pounds. What did he put in the barrel?
I was born in a small house and I live in it all alone. No windows and no doors have been assigned to my house. The only way I can go out is by breaking through the walls of my house.
A new Engineering building containing 100 offices had just been completed. John was hired to paint the numbers 1 to 100 on the doors. How many times will John have to paint the number nine (9)?
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.
