op@ames-lm.UUCP (Operations) (02/01/84)
I don't know if this one was ever posted since I'm relatively new to the net but here it goes. By the way, I don't know the answer and would appreciate it if someone out there does. Three people go to a hotel for the night. The guy at the desk tells them that it will be $30 for the night. So each of them give the clerk $10 and they go up to their room. The clerk then realizes that it should have been $25 for the night not $30 and gives the bellboy $5 to take up the room. The bellboy decides that he will give each of them $1 and keep $2 for himself. So they actually paid $9 each and the bellboy kept $2 totaling to $29. What happened to the missing dollar? Michael Lee NASA Ames Research Center Moffett Field, CA
jeff@heurikon.UUCP (02/03/84)
The dollar didn't go anywhere. The wording of the problem
simply coerces the reader into thinking he should take three
times nine and the *add* the two dollars and try to get $30.
The mathematics should go like this: multiply three times
nine and *subtract* the two dollars, trying to get $25, which
you do. But it's a teaser, all right!
The three each paid (net) $9.00, for a total of $27.00
The bellboy got $2.00 out of the $27.00
The hotel got the difference, $25.00
--
/"""\ Jeffrey Mattox, Heurikon Corp, Madison, WI
|O.O| {harpo, hao, philabs}!seismo!uwvax!heurikon!jeff (news & mail)
\_=_/ ihnp4!heurikon!jeff (mail - fast)ags@pucc-i (Seaman) (02/03/84)
If your objective is to account for the original $30, then it's Paid for the room $25 Bellboy's "tip" 2 Change 3 --------------------------- TOTAL $30 Note that the bellboy's $2 is part of the $27 which you say they paid for the room. In order to get $29, you counted the bellboy's $2 twice and you failed to count the change at all. -- Dave Seaman ..!pur-ee!pucc-i:ags "Against people who give vent to their loquacity by extraneous bombastic circumlocution."