Math riddles

logicmath

Think of a number. Double it. Add ten. Half it. Take away the number you started with. What is your number?
Your number is 5.
71.88 %
55 votes
logicmathcleanclever

You are on a gameshow and the host shows you three doors. Behind one door is a suitcase with $1 million in it, and behind the other two doors are sacks of coal. The host tells you to choose a door, and that the prize behind that door will be yours to keep. You point to one of the three doors. The host says, "Before we open the door you pointed to, I am going to open one of the other doors." He points to one of the other doors, and it swings open, revealing a sack of coal behind it. "Now I will give you a choice," the host tells you. "You can either stick with the door you originally chose, or you can choose to switch to the other unopened door." Should you switch doors, stick with your original choice, or does it not matter?
You should switch doors. There are 3 possibilities for the first door you picked: You picked the first wrong door - so if you switch, you win You picked the other wrong door - again, if you switch, you win You picked the correct door - if you switch, you lose Each of these cases are equally likely. So if you switch, there is a 2/3 chance that you will win (because there is a 2/3 chance that you are in one of the first two cases listed above), and a 1/3 chance you'll lose. So switching is a good idea. Another way to look at this is to imagine that you're on a similar game show, except with 100 doors. 99 of those doors have coal behind them, 1 has the money. The host tells you to pick a door, and you point to one, knowing almost certainly that you did not pick the correct one (there's only a 1 in 100 chance). Then the host opens 98 other doors, leave only the door you picked and one other door closed. We know that the host was forced to leave the door with money behind it closed, so it is almost definitely the door we did not pick initially, and we would be wise to switch. Search: Monty Hall problem
71.80 %
76 votes
logicmathsimpleclever

We all know that square root of number 121 is 11. But do you know what si the square root of the number "12345678987654321" ?
111111111 Explanation: It's a maths magical square root series as : Square root of number 121 is 11 Square root of number 12321 is 111 Square root of number 1234321 is 1111 Square root of number 123454321 is 11111 Square root of number 12345654321 is 111111 Square root of number 1234567654321 is 1111111 Square root of number 123456787654321 is 11111111 Square root of number 12345678987654321 is 111111111 (answer)
71.74 %
80 votes
logicmathcleancleversimple

If you're 8 feet away from a door and with each move you advance half the distance to the door. How many moves will it take to reach the door?
You will never reach the door! If you only move half the distance, then you will always have half the distance remaining no matter, how small is the number.
71.67 %
88 votes
logiccleanclevermath

At a dinner party, many of the guests exchange greetings by shaking hands with each other while they wait for the host to finish cooking. After all this handshaking, the host, who didn't take part in or see any of the handshaking, gets everybody's attention and says: "I know for a fact that at least two people at this party shook the same number of other people's hands." How could the host know this? Note that nobody shakes his or her own hand.
Assume there are N people at the party. Note that the least number of people that someone could shake hands with is 0, and the most someone could shake hands with is N-1 (which would mean that they shook hands with every other person). Now, if everyone at the party really were to have shaken hands with a different number of people, then that means somone must have shaken hands with 0 people, someone must have shaken hands with 1 person, and so on, all the way up to someone who must have shaken hands with N-1 people. This is the only possible scenario, since there are N people at the party and N different numbers of possible people to shake hands with (all the numbers between 0 and N-1 inclusive). But this situation isn't possible, because there can't be both a person who shook hands with 0 people (call him Person 0) and a person who shook hands with N-1 people (call him Person N-1). This is because Person 0 shook hands with nobody (and thus didn't shake hands with Person N-1), but Person N-1 shook hands with everybody (and thus did shake hands with Person 0). This is clearly a contradiction, and thus two of the people at the party must have shaken hands with the same number of people. Pretend there were only 2 guests at the party. Then try 3, and 4, and so on. This should help you think about the problem. Search: Pigeonhole principle
71.64 %
63 votes
logicmathclever

A grandfather's clock chimes the appropriate number of times to indicate the hour, as well as chiming once at each quarter hour. If you were in another room and hear the clock chime just once, what would be the longest period of time you would have to wait in order to be certain of the correct time?
You would have to wait 90 minutes between 12:15 and 1:45. Once you had heard seven single chimes, you would know that the next chime would be two chimes for 2 o'clock.
71.56 %
67 votes
mathtricky

Take 9 from 6, 10 from 9, 50 from 40 and leave 6. How is it possible?
SIX - 9 (IX) = S 9 (IX) - 10 (X) = I 40 (XL) - 50 (L) = X
71.53 %
50 votes
logicmathcleantricky

You have a sock drawer. It has 4 black socks, 8 brown socks, 2 white socks and 8 tan socks. You need to pull out a matching pair of socks in the dark. There is no light and you couldn't see the socks. How many socks you should pull out in the dark to get one matching pair of socks?
Five. You have only four different colors of socks. If you pick 5, you can surely get one pair of matching socks.
71.45 %
75 votes