Noah and Emma, track stars with superb hearing, ran as fast as they could to catch up to the ice cream truck in the next town over. They averaged 6 miles per hour, then rested to enjoy their ice cream. They averaged 4 miles per hour over the same distance on the way back. Not counting the time they rested, what was their average speed?
4.8 miles per hour. 5 mph is tempting, but incorrect. Pick any distance, say 12 miles there and 12 miles back. They take two hours to cover the first 12 miles and three hours to cover the return trip. In 5 hours they covered 24 miles which is an overall average of 4.8 miles per hour.
A tailor can make a pair of pants from the scraps left over from sewing up five pairs of pants. If he has twenty-five scraps, how many pairs of pants can he make?
Six pairs of pants. He can make five initially, but once he’s done making five pairs of pants, he’ll have five remaining sets of scraps, meaning he can make an additional pair of pants, totaling six.
They are the origins of the names of each day of the week.
Sunday – Sun day. Monday – Moon day. Tuesday – Tiw’s or Týr’s day, the god of single combat, son of Odin. Wednesday – Woden’s or Odin’s day, god of poetry and of the dead. Thursday – Thor’s day, god of thunder, son of Odin. Friday – Frigg’s day, goddess of the clouds, wife of Odin. Saturday – Saturn’s day, god of fertility and agriculture.
Given a corked bottle with only a penny inside, how can you remove the penny without pulling out the cork, breaking the bottle and leaving the cork intact?
Second. Second place is next to winning. Seconds, the measure of time, pass quickly. Seconding a motion is requested by the chair of the body in Parliament. And the second place finisher in many sporting events such as the Olympics is awarded the silver medal.
And as for why the unit of time is called a second, it goes back to the days of Ptolemy. A second of time is the second small part, or pars minuta secunda, of an hour. (Thanks to Tim J for researching it).
I hesitated to add this because it’s poorly worded, ambiguous and the answer could be almost anything. I prefer teasers with a single answer, but there you go.
If you came up with a different answer and can explain how you did it, don’t think you’re wrong. It’s probably just as valid. Feel free to share yours in the comments.
My answer for the first number is 2.
Here’s how I got it.
The generic rule for a number in the sequence is: 2^(n – 1) + 1, where n is the position in the sequence.
Note: The teaser doesn’t specify the position of 17. In this case, it’s fifth.
Position 1: (so n = 1) is 2^(1 – 1) + 1 = 2
Position 2: 2^(2 – 1) + 1 = 3
Position 3: 2^(3 – 1) + 1 = 5
Position 4: 2^(4 – 1) + 1 = 9
Position 5: 2^(5 – 1) + 1 = 17
For the curious, the next 5 numbers of the sequence would be:
