Two bikes are traveling toward each other at a constant speed of 10 mph. When the bikes are 20 miles apart, a bee flies from the front wheel of one of the bikes toward the other bike at a constant speed of 25 mph. As soon as it reaches the front wheel of the other bike, it immediately turns around and flies at 25 mph toward the first bike. It continues this pattern until the two bikes smush the bee between the two front tires.
The easiest way to think about this is to consider the time. The bikes will take 1 hour to touch, given that they start 20 miles apart and are each traveling toward each other at 10 mph.
Therefore the bee is buzzing back and forth at 25 mph for 1 hour.
What is the longest unscientific English word that uses every letter in the word exactly twice? For example, noon has two Ns and two Os, but it’s not nearly long enough.
Happenchance. There are two Hs, two As, and so on for all the letters in the word. The longest scientific word with the same property is probably esophagographers.
A worm. Worms don’t have eyes or ears, but they can sense light and their bodies can detect vibrations in the ground. Fishers use worms as bait and the term bookwork is used for someone who loves to read.
The four suits in a deck of standard playing cards
The Spade is a gardener’s tool.
The Diamond is the hardest gem to break. “Little Girl and Queen” is a Mother Goose rhyme, in which the Queen gave the girl a large diamond for picking the Queen some roses.
The Heart bonds with the mind to form love. Absence makes the heart grow fonder.
The Club, or Clover, is three dots connected around a stem.
You’re waiting to board your flight at the airport with 99 other passengers, each with an assigned seat. All but one of the passengers will gladly sit in their designated seat. The only exception is Randall, a scoundrel who refuses to follow the rules. When he boards, he will choose a random, unoccupied seat.
If a rule-following passenger finds someone in their spot, they will choose another one at a random from the remaining unoccupied seats.
What is the probability that the last person to board the plane will sit in their proper seat?
The randomness stops as soon as someone else sits in Randall’s assigned seat. The chances of this happening range from 1 out of 99 to 1 out of 1 (when only one seat remains).
Thus, the probability of the last person sitting in their own seat can be calculated as 1/99 plus the sum of 2 to 98 of the formula 1 / n × (n + 1), which works out to 0.5, or 50%.
So there’s a 50% chance the last passenger will sit in their own seat thanks to Randall for screwing up order and procedure when boarding an aircraft.