The moon. Even though the true moon cycle is about 29.5 days, it takes 27 days, 7 hours, and 43 minutes for our Moon to complete one full orbit around Earth. Thus you can see the full moon every 27 days or you can moon yourself every day in the mirror. Not that you’d want to. Does anyone moon themselves? Can’t say as I’ve ever had the “pleasure”.
You have a lighter and two fuses that take exactly one hour to burn, but they don’t burn at a steady rate. For example, one fuse could take 59 minutes to burn the first inch and then burn the rest of the fuse in the last minute.
How would you use these two fuses to measure 45 minutes?
Light the first fuse on both ends and the second fuse at only one end. When the first fuse burns out you know 30 minutes have passed. Light the other end of the second fuse and when it burns out, 45 minutes have passed.
Shawn and Kyle are bunk mates in prison and are desperate to escape. There is an unbarred window high above them, but the walls are smooth and it’s too high for them to reach even when standing on each other’s shoulders. Their cell has no furnishings other than a toilet and even when standing on the toilet and each other’s shoulders, they can’t reach the window.
They’ve tried digging through the dirt floor but the wall extends 50 feet below. How could escape through the window?
They could dig down with their hands, but it would take too long to dig 50 feet down. Instead, they could pile the dirt they dig up to give them enough height to reach the window. If they put the toilet seat down, they could pile the dirt on top, then get on each other’s shoulders to reach the window. That would mean only one of them would be able to get out. The remaining prisoner could either continue piling dirt to account for the missing guy or the escaped prisoner could come back with a rope to help his mate escape.
Jim and Wanda both have some apples. If Jim gives Wanda an apple, they will both have the same number of apples. However, if Wanda gives Jim an apple, Jim will have twice as many as Wanda. How many apples do Jim and Wanda each have?
Franklin. It’s a list of the men on U.S. currency, $1, $2, $5, $10, $20 and $50. The $100 bill has Franklin. And an interesting tidbit is that Hamilton, along with Franklin, are the only two men in the list who did not serve as president.
Four cards are placed in front of you on the table, each with a number on one side and a color on the other. The visible cards show 3, 8, red and brown. Which cards should you turn over in order to test the truth of the statement that if a card shows an even number on one face, then its opposite face is red?
You’d need to turn over only the 8 and brown card. Only a card with an even number on one face and which is not red on the other face can invalidate the stated rule. If you turn over the 3 card and it’s not red, it doesn’t invalidate the rule, nor does turning over the red card and finding it has the label 3.
This test was devised by Peter Cathcart Wason and is known as the Wason selection task. Less than 10% of test subjects got it correct in two separate studies.
