{"id":124,"date":"2018-12-28T18:57:47","date_gmt":"2018-12-28T23:57:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/?p=124"},"modified":"2025-03-01T09:04:24","modified_gmt":"2025-03-01T14:04:24","slug":"ant-problem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/2018\/12\/28\/ant-problem\/","title":{"rendered":"Ant Problem"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-large wp-image-180\" src=\"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/Ant-Prob-Ant-Line-1024x216.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"625\" height=\"132\" srcset=\"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/Ant-Prob-Ant-Line-1024x216.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/Ant-Prob-Ant-Line-300x63.jpg 300w, https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/Ant-Prob-Ant-Line-768x162.jpg 768w, https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/Ant-Prob-Ant-Line-624x132.jpg 624w, https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/Ant-Prob-Ant-Line.jpg 1048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 625px) 100vw, 625px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>This is one of Alex Bellos\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/science\/mathematics\">Monday Puzzles<\/a> in the <em>Guardian<\/em>. I basically found the same solution as Bellos and his commenters, but wrote it up with what I thought were more explanatory graphics. The idea is that there is a bunch of ants on a stick who all walk a the same speed of 1 centimeter per second. When an ant runs into another ant, they both turn around and go the opposite direction. \u201c<em>So here is the puzzle: <strong>Which ant is the last to fall off the stick? And how long will it be before he or she does fall off?<\/strong><\/em>\u201d\u00a0 See the <a href=\"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/Ant-Problem-160119.pdf\">Ant Problem<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/Ant-Problem-Answer.jpg\">Answer<\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>(Update 3\/1\/2025)\u00a0 Alternative Problem<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Consider what happens when the stick is bent into a ring.\u00a0 See the <a href=\"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/2025\/03\/01\/circular-ant-problem\/\">Circular Ant Problem<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This is one of Alex Bellos\u2019s Monday Puzzles in the Guardian. I basically found the same solution as Bellos and his commenters, but wrote it up with what I thought were more explanatory graphics. The idea is that there is a bunch of ants on a stick who all walk a the same speed of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[15,81],"class_list":["post-124","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-puzzles-and-problems","tag-alex-bellos","tag-travel-puzzles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=124"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4307,"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124\/revisions\/4307"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=124"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=124"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=124"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}