Tag Archives: algebra

Loggers Problem

Here is another delightful problem from the Sherlock Holmes puzzle book by Dr. Watson (aka Tim Dedopulos).

“In Sussex, Holmes and I ran into a pair of woodcutters named Doug and Dave. There was an air of the unreliable about them—not helped by a clearly discernable aroma of scrumpy—but they nevertheless proved extremely helpful in guiding us to a particular hilltop clearing some distance outside of the town of Arundel. A shadowy group had been counterfeiting sorceries of a positively medieval kind, and all sorts of nastiness had ensued.

The Adventure of the Black Alchemist is not one that I would feel comfortable recounting, and if my life never drags me back to Chanctonbury Ring I shall be a happy man. But there is still some instructive material here. Whilst we were ascending our hill, Doug and Dave made conversation by telling us about their trade. According to these worthies, working together they were able to saw 600 cubic feet of wood into large logs over the course of a day, or split as much as 900 cubic feet of logs into chunks of firewood.

Holmes immediately suggested that they saw as much wood in the first part of the day as they would need in order to finish splitting it at the end of the day. It naturally fell to me to calculate precisely how much wood that would be.

Can you find the answer?”

Answer.

See the Loggers Problem for solutions.

Rufus Puzzle

Again we have a puzzle from the Sherlock Holmes puzzle book by Dr. Watson (aka Tim Dedopulos).  This one is quite a bit more challenging, at least for me.

“When Holmes and I met with Wiggins one afternoon, he was accompanied by a rather scrappy-looking mutt, who eyed me with evident suspicion.

‘This is Rufus,’ Wiggins said. ‘He’s a friend.’

‘Charmed,’ I said.

‘He’s very energetic,’ Wiggins told us. ‘Just this morning, he and I set out for a little walk.’

At the word ‘walk’, the dog barked happily.

‘When we set out, he immediately dashed off to the end of the road, then turned round and bounded back to me. He did this four times in total, in fact. After that, he settled down to match my speed, and we walked the remaining 81 feet to the end of the road at my pace. But it seems to me that if I tell you the distance from where we started to the end of the road, which is 625 feet, and that I was walking at four miles an hour, you ought to be able to work out how fast Rufus goes when he’s running.’

‘Indeed we should,’ said Holmes, and turned to look at me expectantly.

What’s the dog’s running speed?”

Answer.

See the Rufus Puzzle for solutions.

Family Values

Here is a collection of puzzles from the great logic puzzle master Raymond Smullyan in a “Brain Bogglers” column for the 1996 Discover magazine.

  1. ELDON WHITE HAS FOUR DOGS. One day he put out a bowl of dog biscuits. The eldest dog came first and ate half the biscuits plus one more. Then the next dog came and ate half of what he found plus one more. Then the next one came and ate half of what she found plus one more. Then the little one came and ate half of what she found and one more, and that finished the biscuits. How many biscuits were originally in the bowl?
  2. Eldon once bought a very remarkable plant, which, on the first day, increased its height by a half, on the second day by a third, on the third day by a quarter, and so on. How many days did it take to grow to 100 times its original height?
  3. In addition to four dogs, Eldon has four children. The youngest, Betty, is nine years old; then there are twin boys, Arthur and Robert; and finally there’s Laura, the eldest, whose age is equal to the combined ages of Betty and Arthur. Also, the combined ages of the twins are the same as the combined ages of the youngest and the eldest. How old is each child?
  4. “How about a riddle?” asked Robert. “Very well,” said Eldon. “What is it that is larger than the universe, the dead eat it, and if the living eat it, they die?”

Answer.

See Family Values  for solutions.

Tree Trunk Puzzle

Here is another problem (slightly edited) from the Sherlock Holmes puzzle book by Dr. Watson (aka Tim Dedopulos).

“Holmes and I were walking along a sleepy lane in Hookland, making our way back to the inn at which we had secured lodgings after scouting out the estates of the supposed major, C. L. Nolan. Up ahead, a team of horses were slowly pulling a chained tree trunk along the lane. Fortunately it had been trimmed of its branches, but it was still an imposing sight.

When we’d overtaken the thing, Holmes surprised me by turning sharply on his heel and walking back along the trunk. I stopped where I was to watch him. He continued at a steady pace until he’d passed the last of it, then reversed himself once more, and walked back to me.

‘Come along, old chap,’ he said as he walked past. Shaking my head, I duly followed.

‘It took me 140 paces to walk from the back of the tree to the front, and just twenty to walk from the front to the back,’ he declared.

‘Well of course,’ I said. ‘The tree was moving, after all.’

‘Precisely,’ he said. ‘My pace is one yard in length, so how long is that tree-trunk?’

Can you find the answer?”

Answer.

See the Tree Trunk Puzzle for solutions.

The Track Problem

Again we have a puzzle from the Sherlock Holmes puzzle book by Dr. Watson (aka Tim Dedopulos).

“Our pursuit of the dubious Alan Grey, whom we encountered during The Adventure of the Third Carriage, led Holmes and myself to a circular running track where, as the sun fell, we witnessed a race using bicycles. There was some sort of substantial wager involved in the matter, as I recall, and the track had been closed off specially for the occasion. This was insufficient to prevent our ingress, obviously.

One of the competitors was wearing red, and the other blue. We never did discover their names. As the race started, red immediately pulled ahead. A few moments later, Holmes observed that if they maintained their pace, red would complete a lap in four minutes, whilst blue would complete one in seven.

Having made that pronouncement, he turned to me. ‘How long would it be before red passed blue if they kept those rates up, old chap?’

Whilst I wrestled with the answer, Holmes went back to watching the proceedings. Can you find the solution?”

Answer.

See the Track Problem for a solution.

Calculating on the Way

In looking through some old files I came across a math magazine I had bought in 1998. It was called Quantum and was published by the National Science Teachers Association in collaboration with the Russian magazine Kvant during the period 1990 to 2001 (coinciding with the Russian thaw, which in the following age of Putin seems eons ago). Fortunately, they are all online now. Besides some fascinating math articles the magazine contains a column of “Brainteasers.” Here is one of them:

“Alice used to walk to school every morning, and it took 20 minutes for her from door to door. Once on her way she remembered she was going to show the latest issue of Quantum to her classmates but had forgotten it at home. She knew that if she continued walking to school at the same speed, she’d be there 8 minutes before the bell, and if she went back home for the magazine she’d arrive at school 10 minutes late. What fraction of the way to school had she walked at that moment in time? (S. Dvorianinov)”

This is fairly straight-forward, but other problems in the magazine are a bit more challenging.

Answer.

See Calculating on the Way for solutions.

The Bicycle Problem

A fun, relatively new, Sherlock Holmes puzzle book by Dr. Watson (aka Tim Dedopulos) has puzzles couched in terms of the Holmes-Watson banter. The following problem is a variation on the Sam Loyd Tandem Bicycle Puzzle.

“ ‘Here’s something mostly unrelated for you to chew over, my dear Watson. Say you and I have a single bicycle between us, and no other transport options save walking. We want to get the both of us to a location eighteen miles distant as swiftly as possible. If my walking speed is five miles per hour compared to your four, but for some reason—perhaps a bad ligament—my cycling speed is eight miles per hour compared to your ten. How would you get us simultaneously to our destination with maximum rapidity?’

‘A cab,’ I suggested.

‘Without cheating,’ Holmes replied, and went back to tossing his toast in the air.”

Answer.

See the Bicycle Problem for solutions.

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