A thief is convicted in Mexico. He gets the death penalty. The judge allows him to say the last sentence to determine how the penalty will be carried out. If the thief lies, he will be hanged, if he speaks the truth he will be beheaded. The thief tells the last sentence and to everybody's surprise some minutes later he is set free because the judge cannot determine his penalty. What did the thief say?
15 caves are arranged in a circle at the temple of doom. One of these caves has the treasure of gems and wealth. Each day the treasure keepers can move the treasure to an adjacent cave or can keep it in the same cave. Every day two treasure seekers visit the place and have enough time to enter any two caves of their choice.
How do the treasure seekers ensure that they find the treasure in the minimum number of possible days?
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.