dejongh@osu-dbs.UUCP (Matthew DeJongh) (11/10/83)
Here is one for you who have not seen it before. Tom and Jerry are walking down the street together. Tom says to Jerry: -I have three children. -If you multiply their ages together, you get 36. -If you add their ages together, you get the number of the house across the street. -How old are they? Jerry thinks about it for awhile and asks for another clue, to which Tom replies: -The oldest one plays piano. And Jerry gave him the correct answers. What are their ages and why? I will post the solution in a week or so. --Matt DeJongh
mam@charm.UUCP (11/11/83)
<Here are a bunch of blank lines so you won't see the unrotated answer.>
The ages are (drumroll, please) 2,2,9.
The reasoning: First list all combinations of 3 numbers whose product is
36. You make this easier on yourself if you start by requiring that
the numbers be in ascending order, and starting with a 1 in the first
column:
1 1 36
1 2 18
1 3 12
1 4 9
1 6 6 (this is last one with a 1 first; the next would be
1,9,4 which we already have)
2 2 9
2 3 6
3 3 4
The third clue was that the sum of the ages was some given number. We don't
know what that number is, but we do know that it does not uniquely select
out one of these combinations - if it did, the extra clue wouldn't be needed.
The only lists which have equal sums are
1,6,6 and 2,2,9
Now, we are told some garbage about the "oldest". Thus, there must be an
oldest. Since people in Problem-Land age in discrete steps, there is
no "oldest" in (1,6,6), so the ages must be 2,2,9.
Matthew Marcus
{Bell labs machine}!{physics|charm}!mam