Prisoner to be freed

The warden meets with 23 new prisoners when they arrive. He tells them, "You may meet today and plan a strategy. But after today, you will be in isolated cells and will have no communication with one another.

"In the prison is a switch room, which contains two light switches labeled 1 and 2, each of which can be in either up or the down position. I am not telling you their present positions. The switches are not connected to anything.

"After today, from time to time whenever I feel so inclined, I will select one prisoner at random and escort him to the switch room. This prisoner will select one of the two switches and reverse its position. He must flip one switch when he visits the switch room, and may only flip one of the switches. Then he'll be led back to his cell.

"No one else will be allowed to alter the switches until I lead the next prisoner into the switch room. I'm going to choose prisoners at random. I may choose the same guy three times in a row, or I may jump around and come back. I will not touch the switches, if I wanted you dead you would already be dead.

"Given enough time, everyone will eventually visit the switch room the same number of times as everyone else. At any time, anyone may declare to me, 'We have all visited the switch room.'

"If it is true, then you will all be set free. If it is false, and somebody has not yet visited the switch room, you will all die horribly. You will be carefully monitored, and any attempt to break any of these rules will result in instant death to all of you"

What is the strategy they come up with so that they can be free?




Similar Riddles

Transform the word THINK into BRAIN while changing only one letter at a time in a manner that each of the word in the process is a real word!!!

Asked by Neha on 16 Feb 2023


You have two rectangular wires.

Both of them have property that when you light the fire from one end , it will take 60 minutes to get completely burn.

However, they do not burn at consistent speed (i.e it might be possible 1st 20% burn in 50 minutes and 80% can burn in 10 minutes).

So how could you measure 45 minutes ?

Asked by Neha on 21 Feb 2021

Forwards I am heavy, backward I am not. What am I?

Asked by Neha on 01 Aug 2025


The following "Brain Bat" means Slow Down.
S
L
O
W

Using the same logic, can you tell us what does the following Brain Bat means ?
E
V
I
G

Asked by Neha on 14 May 2021

Two guards were guarding the camp.Guard-1 was looking towards the south to make sure no threat is coming from the road.Guard-2 was looking at the north to make sure no threat is coming from the top. Suddenly Guard-1 ask the Guard-2 why he is smiling?How Guard-1 knows that Guard-2 is smiling?

Asked by Neha on 30 May 2023

Using four sevens (7) and a one (1) create the number 100. Except for the five numerals, you can use the usual mathematical operations (+, -, x, :), root and brackets ()

Asked by Neha on 26 May 2023


'S' refers to the number of seconds in a day and 'H' refers to the number of hours in ten years. Which quantity out of these two is greater?

Asked by Neha on 28 Apr 2025

Katniss and Peeta are liars. They both lie on some specific days.

Katniss lies on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. She speaks the truth on all other days.

Peeta lies on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays. He speaks the truth on all other days.

Can you tell that one day of the week when both of them will say "Tomorrow, I will lie."?

Asked by Neha on 11 Mar 2026

A mother is 21 years older than her child. In exactly 6 years from now, the mother will be exactly 5 times as old as the child.
Where's the father?

Asked by Neha on 26 Jun 2021


Given below is simple addition with a defined pattern pattern:
7 + 7 = 2
8 + 8 = 4
8 + 5 = 1
6 + 9 = 3
10 + 11 = 9

Can you analyze the pattern and find out the answer for:

4 + 9 = ?

Solve the Addition

Asked by Neha on 05 Apr 2021

Hot Articles

Amazing Facts

Artificial Intelligence

Artificial Intelligence has crushed all human records in the puzzle game “2048,” achieving a high score of 839,732 and beating the game in only 973 moves without using any undo.