Your job is to measure 45 minutes if you have only two cords and matches to light the cords.
1. The two cords are twisted from various materials, so their different segments can burn at different rates.
2. Each cord burns from end to end in exactly one hour.
Assume the given figure to be a delicious doughnut. Yes, now you can concentrate more on the puzzle. So you have this delicious doughnut in your refrigerator when your friends come knocking at the door. There are eight of them. Now you have to make three cuts in this doughnut so that each one of you nine people can enjoy a piece of it. Neither you nor your friends would mind the size of their piece as long as they are getting it. How will you do it?
Three men in a cafe order a meal the total cost of which is $15. They each contribute $5. The waiter takes the money to the chef who recognises the three as friends and asks the waiter to return $5 to the men.
The waiter is not only poor at mathematics but dishonest and instead of going to the trouble of splitting the $5 between the three he simply gives them $1 each and pockets the remaining $2 for himself.
Now, each of the men effectively paid $4, the total paid is therefore $12. Add the $2 in the waiters pocket and this comes to $14. Where has the other $1 gone from the original $15?
If you were to put a coin into an empty bottle and then insert a cork into the neck, how could you remove the coin without taking out the cork or breaking the bottle?
The day before the 1996 U.S. presidential election, the NYT Crossword contained the clue “Lead story in tomorrow’s newspaper,” the puzzle was built so that both electoral outcomes were correct answers, requiring 7 other clues to have dual responses.