A Little Puzzle

[merjet]

This is recreation.

John is looking at Jennifer, and Jennifer is looking at Jason. John is married, but Jason is not. Is a married person looking at an unmarried person -- yes, no, or can't be determined?

[turkeyfoot]

Ill take a stab. In both the case of John looking at Jennifer (unknown marital status) and Jennifer looking at Jason there is only enough information to determine the marital status of John and Jason but not of Jennifers. So the questions answer cannot be determined with the information given. Unless its a joke. 

[jts]

56 minutes ago, merjet said:

This is recreation.

John is looking at Jennifer, and Jennifer is looking at Jason. John is married, but Jason is not. Is a married person looking at an unmarried person -- yes, no, or can't be determined?

Yes.

John (married) --> Jennifer (unknown) --> Jason (not married)

Jennifer is either married or not married. Either way a married person is looking at a not married person.

 

[merjet]

Congratulations, jts, you are correct.  Turkeyfoot, don't feel bad, you answered like most people do (link). 

[turkeyfoot]

2 hours ago, merjet said:

Congratulations, jts, you are correct.  Turkeyfoot, don't feel bad, you answered like most people do (link). 

A boy is in a room with no windows or doors with only a table and a mirror. How does he get out of the room. Macgyver will not help you. )

 

[Jon Letendre]

Merlin, I have only thought about it for about a minute, have not read any responses.

I haven't thought out the possibilities, but the thought occurs to me that the Jennifer's can be the same person, or there could be two Jennifers.

Now I will think more about it.

[Jon Letendre]

Assuming only one Jennifer, she must be married, or not married.

If she is married, then yes, a married person is looking at an unmarried person, Jennifer looking at Jason.

If she is not married, then yes, John looking at Jennifer.

In either case, yes, a married person is looking at an unmarried person.

[Jon Letendre]

Geoff, the boy in the room is more difficult.

How about, there is no ceiling or roof, get on the table, grab the top of a wall and pull himself up, over and out?

[Jon Letendre]

Walk down to the basement and exit the bulkhead or Windows there.

[Jon Letendre]

Go upstairs and jump a window there.

[Jon Letendre]

Walk right out the doorway. Afterall, the door isn't there.

[Jon Letendre]

Break the mirror, cut the jugular, rise to heaven.

Then again, if souls are not everlasting, there will no longer be any "he/him," so he will have failed to be outside the room. But he won't be in the room anymore, and that is step one, so a kind of partial success.

[Brant Gaede]

1 hour ago, turkeyfoot said:

A boy is in a room with no windows or doors with only a table and a mirror. How does he get out of the room. Macgyver will not help you. )

 

The way he got in.

--Brant

[BaalChatzaf]

28 minutes ago, Brant Gaede said:

The way he got in.

--Brant

Suppose after he got in (through a door, say) and we seal the door sold?  His mirror could not be used to cut has way out (say the door was welded shut).  

[Brant Gaede]

6 minutes ago, BaalChatzaf said:

Suppose after he got in (through a door, say) and we seal the door sold?  His mirror could not be used to cut has way out (say the door was welded shut).  

You don't know how he got in. My answer does not require specifics. The only proper reply to me is specifics are required and why by supplying them yourself. I can't; I'm not that clever.

Someone? Anyone?

--Brant

[jts]

2 hours ago, turkeyfoot said:

A boy is in a room with no windows or doors with only a table and a mirror. How does he get out of the room. Macgyver will not help you. )

 

I googled the answer.

Look in the mirror, then at the wall and back at the mirror to see what you saw. Use the saw to cut the table in half and join the two halves to make a whole. Put the “hole” on the wall and climb out.

Is there any reason to believe there was a problem; was the room enclosed? What were the walls made of; can they be kicked down? Can he beam out Star Trek style? Can he walk thru the walls like a ghost? Maybe whoever put him in the room let him out. Maybe he pulled out his phaser and blasted a hole. Maybe he deactivated the force field. Maybe he dug a hole in the ground and under a wall.

 

[Jon Letendre]

4 hours ago, Brant Gaede said:

You don't know how he got in. My answer does not require specifics. The only proper reply to me is specifics are required and why by supplying them yourself. I can't; I'm not that clever.

Someone? Anyone?

--Brant

He got in by walking through the doorway. Maybe it is a new place, still unfinished, doors not hung yet. Or maybe the doors are off to move the couch. There are no doors in this room, but he can still just walk out,

[turkeyfoot]

7 hours ago, jts said:

I googled the answer.

Look in the mirror, then at the wall and back at the mirror to see what you saw. Use the saw to cut the table in half and join the two halves to make a whole. Put the “hole” on the wall and climb out.

Is there any reason to believe there was a problem; was the room enclosed? What were the walls made of; can they be kicked down? Can he beam out Star Trek style? Can he walk thru the walls like a ghost? Maybe whoever put him in the room let him out. Maybe he pulled out his phaser and blasted a hole. Maybe he deactivated the force field. Maybe he dug a hole in the ground and under a wall.

 

Yes, jts. 

Apologies to everyone. I saw this in Highlights magazine as a boy of 8 or so. Theres no right answer, its an imaginative cluster f and entertained me. While you guys wondered at the sheer folly of it Im sleepless in Va absorbing the personal implications of merjets little puzzle. Its similar to a feeling of being in a room with no way out yet realizing there could be. )

Just, maybe not....in an O'ist forum. 

[turkeyfoot]

10 hours ago, Jon Letendre said:

Walk right out the doorway. Afterall, the door isn't there. 

Cerebral! In my opinion ^ is the correct answer.

Walk down to the basement and exit the bulkhead or Windows there.

Sounds as if youve built things.

[Jon Letendre]

5 hours ago, turkeyfoot said:

Cerebral! In my opinion ^ is the correct answer.

Walk down to the basement and exit the bulkhead or Windows there.

Sounds as if youve built things.

Yes, sort of. I was a landlord for years and taught myself some carpentry, electrical, plumbing. I perpetually renovate my place but have never built one.

I think my aptitude for this puzzle comes from growing up in New England around town cops who were very harsh on us. They would bust up our parties and more than once I was locked in the house (not my house) with all the other minors. If you had ID and were 18+ they threw you outside. The cops would actually bring in buses to transport the minors to their station where we would have to wait for parental pickup. Well, that just wasn't how Jonny did things.

Once, they had about fifty of us in the basement. A cop was outside at the bulkhead and others at the windows. The only way was back upstairs, also guarded. So I approached the cop at the top of the stairs and declared a bathroom emergency. He wasn't buying it, so I started to wet myself and hold my stomach and act out imminent vomit. He had a colleague take over guarding the stair and he walked me upstairs to the bathroom and stayed right outside waiting. I guess he didnt think of the window or thought it was too high up given the slope of the yard or too cold outside, but obviously I went right out the window. Bad landing. It hurt, but I was fine. Then I walked a few blocks away to where my car was parked. Picture a couple hundred kids outside the house. Some are going to their cars and leaving, but others came with minor drivers who are locked in the basement, so they are milling about wondering what to do now. I drive up, looking just like the other adults there to pick up some 18 and 19 year olds. As it happened, I drove three pals to this party. I'm 17 but look 20. So I pull right up the ride-arranger cop who asked "who are you here for?" I say, my stupid nephew and two of his friends, Rodd, Jay and Eric. He yells into the crowd, "Rodd, Jay, Eric!" They're not expecting any ride to arrive for them so the look on their faces was priceless... Oh my god, it's fucking Jonny. Straight face. Don't laugh. Laugh later. Straight face.

[turkeyfoot]

3 hours ago, Jon Letendre said:

Yes, sort of. I was a landlord for years and taught myself some carpentry, electrical, plumbing. I perpetually renovate my place but have never built one.

I think my aptitude for this puzzle comes from growing up in New England around town cops who were very harsh on us. 

That story pairs nicely with the imaginative attempts to solve the boy in a room problem. 

I stick built a few houses during 5 yrs of general carpentry work.

[Jon Letendre]

8 hours ago, turkeyfoot said:

That story pairs nicely with the imaginative attempts to solve the boy in a room problem. 

I stick built a few houses during 5 yrs of general carpentry work.

That's honest work. I've only framed closets and walls. But I must say, at my place, after twenty years the load-bearing walls I've switched up and put where I wanted, including posts and pads to ground in the crawl-space, drywall, mud, rosettes and casing, and nothing has moved, nothing has so much as hairline cracked.

Good carpenters are amazing. I watch and wonder, 'how could he never stop to think? He never even pauses.' I spend an hour staring, drawing and thinking per ten minutes and doing.

Rough-in plumbers, too. I watched one once who seemed to take no measurements, yet would make unique cuts, around a foot long, inches more and less each time - cuts that I know have to be within 1/2" - and he would get them right, over and over. No measurement taken while he's sitting on the floor looking at the hole in the floor, and no measurement when he's at the tablesaw. It bugged me, I had to figure it out and I didn't want to have to ask. I finally got it, I think. He seemed to put his arm in the hole, land his finger at the endpoint and, so quickly you could miss it, he would take a glance at which freckle or part of a tattoo forward of his elbow was landing flush to the floor. At the table he would pick up a pipe, lift it up and glance at his arm, noting what lettter printed on the pipe landed at the freckle or tattoo feature, put the pipe on the tablesaw and cut through that letter.

As with carpentry, I spend an hour staring, thinking, doubting and measuring again for every ten minutes of tangible fitting.

[turkeyfoot]

11 hours ago, Jon Letendre said:

As with carpentry, I spend an hour staring, thinking, doubting and measuring again for every ten minutes of tangible fitting.

Ive got to laugh because that describes what I did working on merjets puzzle and I got it wrong. Yes, its official, I am miserly, cognitively speaking. )

35 yrs ago as an apprentice Id hear about a 3 man piece crew working on down the street of a prefabbed home job where I did inside framing. They led the pace for all the trades. When the crane came, we would take a break and watch these athletes in action. My jaw was on the floor, never saw anything like it. The main guy was flamboyant and extremely competent scampering along walls at a breakneck pace as his buddies braced the next piece while the crane delivered several more at a time. He literally squirreled 20' spans on 1 1/2" edges on 2 x 10"' cathedral ceiling rafters 3 stories up making small body adjustments to stay upright while keeping a dialogue with his mates. Theyd come in early am and call it a day by noon. A couple summers later I asked about him and learned hed taken a management position after a fall. I wasnt cut from the same cloth realizing there was something special about handling plywood sheets unassisted on 7/12 roofs.

This past spring I found a way to get past the insufferable pace of stripping boards fastened with 16p twist nails from a 50' x 30' dock. Id lost a wonder bar and hammer working above water, was shopping for a magnet to retrieve them and came across what can only be described as a Deck Wrecker. The dock builder put a $25k tag on what were $4k material costs, sweat equity and getting in swim suit shape. )

 

  

 

[Jon Letendre]

Ha, insufferable is right. I hate ripping things up. Go faster and cause more damage, or go slower and feel the brain damage, great choice!

[turkeyfoot]

On 8/18/2016 at 2:35 PM, merjet said:

This is recreation.

John is looking at Jennifer, and Jennifer is looking at Jason. John is married, but Jason is not. Is a married person looking at an unmarried person -- yes, no, or can't be determined?

There is a perfectly reasonable way to find the answer to be - c, or cant be determined. Id challenge the bias that indicates to the "normal" person that Jennifer is a person. To prove it insert Jasmine or Jody (two of 100 popular female dogs names). Or that Jason is a person since it cant be known since he is termed unmarried. I can see how the questioner could have better posed the puzzle using names like Tom Dick and Jane which would have done a better job of  perhaps delimiting the information to mean the human aspect by applying a cultural bias that few us would decipher as meaning anything other than human.

A bias was introduced and can easily determine that the trick being used by the questioner is to force an assumption that doesnt appear in the puzzle. 

To answer the question "correctly" we have to assume that Jennifer is human. We have proof that John is and Jason is not.

To make assumptions in solving a problem like this when its lean on real evidence is an incorrect way of solving the puzzle. 

As much as it thrills me to say I found a different way of looking at this, I freely admit to being wrong because at first glance I assumed the human context.  

Dysrationalia is the word I kept coming across as I linked to the puzzle piece. Stanovich, who derived the word said intelligence doesnt equate to rationality. A person can be highly intelligent but lack the experience or logical thinking needed to make rational decisions. He refers to this as mind ware gaps and cognitive miserliess. He further says that some people have contaminated mindware, such as superstition, which leads to irrational decisions. 

Considering the merits of his theories and the personal issues Ive dealt with it has had a profound affect on how Ive come to regard the things people do to others. There are simply some things I wont understand using conventional social methods until the stamp of irrationality is imposed on them.

Some of this strikes a chord in that Im prone to making mistakes and misconstruing information in the intellectual department so knowing there is a "diagnosis" and a body of knowledge made my day . Im not an academic minded guy, didnt play one on TV and didnt stay at a Holiday Inn last night. But the thing I continually come back to is an injunction to use the evidence provided by the senses, and let reality be the guide (A is A).

I believe Ive proven the answer from only the words stated in the puzzle. Its c. ) With the caveat that there isnt enough information for proof. Not that it cant be determined. )

This much is true. Making assumptions tends to make an ass out of me and you. ;)