The Densest of My Clan

You ride on me every day but barely notice,
I’m hot and cold at the very same time,
I’m the densest of my clan,
And my first three help you enjoy music.

What am I?

Earth. Most people don’t stop to think that they’re hurtling through space on a huge planet. At any given time the Earth has burning hot magma and freezing arctics at the same time. The Earth is the densest planet and the first three letters, “ear” help you listen to music.

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Odd Word Out

One of these words does not belong, one of these words is not the same. What is it about the words that does not belong? It is more apparent than the first letter not being the same.

Selflessness
Selfishness
Strengthlessness
Defencelessness

Selfishness. The rest have only one of the vowels.

Posted in Brain Teasers

The Ants Go Marching

Three ants are walking in the same direction. The first ant has two ants behind him, the second ant has one in front and one behind, but the third ant has one in front and one behind too. How is this possible?

The ants are in a circle. Lets say the ants are A, B and C. A has has B and C behind him, B has A in front and C behind, and C has B in front and A behind.

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Job Hopping Jeremy

Jeremy was making $10 an hour at his summer job, but he hated the work. He decided to take a 50% pay cut to work at an easier job. He liked his new job at first, then grew bored and found another job paying 50% more than he was currently making. What was his hourly pay at the third job?

$7.50. If you guessed $10, don’t feel bad. Percentages can be counter intuitive.

First job: $10/hour
Second job: $10/hour – ($10 &times .5) = $5/hour
Third job: $5/hour + ($5 × .5) = $7.50

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How Are These Countries Ordered?

How are these countries ordered?

1. Canada
2. Indonesia
3. Russia
4. Philippines
5. Japan
6. Australia
7. Norway
8. United States
9. New Zealand
10. China

By kilometers of coastline (according to the CIA World Factbook).

1. Canada – 202,080 km / 125,567 mi
2. Indonesia – 54,716 km / 33,998 mi
3. Russia – 37,653 km / 23,396 mi
4. Philippines – 36,289 km / 22548 mi
5. Japan – 29,751 km / 18,486 mi
6. Australia – 25,760 km / 16,006 mi
7. Norway – 25,148 km / 15,626 mi
8. United States – 19,924 km / 12,380 mi
9. New Zealand – 15,134 km / 9403 mi
10. China – 14,500 km / 9009 mi

Note: Greenland has 44,087 km of coastline but it is not yet a fully independent country.

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Letters, Letters, What Comes Next?

What letter comes next letter in this series?

A E F H I ___

K. It’s the series of capital letters without curves in alphabetical order.

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How Old is Malcolm, His Dad and Grandfather?

Malcolm is the number of weeks of his father’s age treated as days and his grandfather’s age in months. All three of their ages add up to 120 years. How old is Malcolm, his father and his grandfather?

Malcolm is 6.
The father is 42. 42 days = 6 weeks.
The grandfather is 72. 72 months = 6 years.

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Working With Something In Its Eye

What always works with something in its eye?

A needle. Thread goes in the eye of the needle when you sew. If you sew…

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Largest Product

Using all the digits from 1 to 7, what two numbers have the largest product? For example, 1234 x 567 = 699678 but you can do much better than that.

742 x 6531 = 4,846,002.

A similar problem can be found in L.A. Graham’s Ingenious Mathematical Problems and Methods with a range of 1 to 9, but the principle remains the same – the numbers with the smallest difference produce the largest product. You start out with the highest two digits, 7 and 6, then attach 5 and 4, putting the smaller of the two digits with the larger number, giving you 74 and 65. The next two highest digits are 3 and 2, giving you 742 and 653. Finally, you add the 1 to the lower number. Page 80 has the details of that solution.

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Alone I’m Unknown

Alone I’m unknown,
With my twin I’m twenty,
And triplets make me a warning.

What am I?

The letter ‘X’. A single x is often used in math as an unknown, along with Mr. X. Two together (XX) make the Roman numeral 20, and three signifies a warning for adult only content, or a warning to other programmers of a problem in source code.

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