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"Marbles" Riddles - 7 of 7
Riddle:
You are about to be executed, but the king gives you a chance. He says that he will divide 100 marbles in half. 50 of them are black and 50 are white. You can arrange them however you like into two bowls, but you must use all the marbles. The king will then blindfold you and switch them around. Then you choose a single marble from whichever bowl you put your hand randomly in. If you choose a white marble you can live, but if you choose a black one you die. How do you divide the marbles so there is a 50-50 chance you will live?
Answer: You need to put one white marble in one of the bowls. Then the remaining 49 go with the 50 black marbles. Then you will have a good chance of living.
Riddle:
A king decided to let a prisoner try to escape the prison with his life. The king placed 2 marbles in a jar that was glued to a table. One of the marbles was supposed to be black, and one was supposed to be blue. If the prisoner could pick the blue marble, he would escape the prison with his life. If he picked the black marble, he would be executed. However, the king was very mean, and he wickedly placed 2 black marbles in the jars and no blue marbles. The prisoner witnessed the king only putting 2 black marbles in the jars. If the jar was not see-through and the jar was glued to the table and the prisoner was mute so he could not say anything, how did he escape with his life?
Answer: The prisoner grabbed one of the marbles from the jar and concealed it in his hand. He then swallowed it, and picked up the other marble and showed everyone. The marble was black, and since the other marble was swallowed, it was assumed to be the blue one. So the mean king had to set him free
Riddle:
Marvin is a typical boy who attends a typical elementary school. However, Marvin is considered by some to be a bit eccentric. His teachers have noted he has a habit of carrying some unusual things in his pockets. Some of these items include: onion skins, some toothpaste, a lifeless bumblebee, a steel ball, pearls, some spaghetti, and a small turtle. The most bizarre item he carries in his pockets though, is far more disturbing --- a cat's eye!!! Why haven't the teachers reported this to the authorities? Where are the animal rights activists when you need them? Why hasn't the school psychologist been contacted so Marvin can receive a mental health evaluation? Of course, it is possible Marvin isn't such a strange little boy after all. What do you think? What's going on here?
Answer: Marvin loves to play the old game of marbles. He always carries some in his pockets, some of which include: onion skins (marbles with a swirled and layered design that resemble an onion); toothpaste (marbles with the colors of red, white, blue, black, and orange inside), bumblebee (a yellow marble with two black stripes on the sides), a ball bearing made of steel called a steelie), pearls (marbles with a mother-of-pearl coating), spaghetti (marbles with entwined lines inside them), a turtle (a marble with green and yellow wavy steaks), and a cat’s eye (a marble which closely resembles the eye of a cat).
Riddle:
Every Thursday morning at 9 a.m. sharp, Miss Alice Gain leaves the comfort of her apartment, and travels about one mile to a place where she does something unpleasant. Upon arriving at her destination, Miss Gain spends between two and three hours looking through two circular windows. As she gazes through these windows, she sometimes sees flashes of white, and sometimes observes streaks of color passing before her eyes. There are several sets of these windows, but Alice usually peers through only two of them. Despite the fact Miss Gain dislikes these visits, she repeats this routine every week; and incredibly, she even has to spend a good amount of money for this activity. Has Alice lost her proverbial marbles, or is there method in her apparent madness? What in the world has Miss Alice Gain been doing?
Answer: From her apartment, Alice travels to a local laundromat to wash her clothing each week. The windows she looks through are the front-loading doors to the washer and dryer, where she usually places her whites into one machine, and her colors into another.
Riddle:
Claudia invented a game for her friends to play at her birthday party. Here is how it goes: she will place two marbles into a box– one yellow marble, and one purple marble. The player will have to pull out one of the marbles from the box. If the marble is yellow, the player will win $100.00, but if the marble is purple, the player will have to pay $10.00. Claudia decided to trick the players by putting two purple marbles into the box, rather than one yellow and one purple. Brian watched the other players lose the game one by one. But when it was his turn, he won $100.00! How did he do it?
Answer: Brian pulled out one of the marbles, and, without showing it to anyone, quickly put it in his mouth, being careful not to swallow it. Then, he pulled out the remaining marble, which was purple, and showed it to everybody. According to the rules, it meant that the marble Brian had chosen was yellow. Claudia had to admit it, otherwise, everyone at the party would know that she was a liar.
Riddle:
There are 55 marbles and 100 bags. You need to put every marble in a way that the 1st bag has 1 marbles, the 2nd bag has 2 marbles and so on. How many bags will you need to use 55 marbles?
Answer: 55 bags. Put a marble in the first bag then the bag goes in the second bag with 1 marble, making the second have 2 marbles. Repeat this until use 55 marbles, in total,the 55th bag has 55 marbles.
Riddle:
You are given a set of scales and 12 marbles. The scales are of the old balance variety. That is, a small dish hangs from each end of a rod that is balanced in the middle. The device enables you to conclude either that the contents of the dishes weigh the same or that the dish that falls lower has heavier contents than the other. The 12 marbles appear to be identical. In fact, 11 of them are identical, and one is of different weight. Your task is to identify the unusual marble and discard it. You are allowed to use the scales three times if you wish, but no more. Note that the unusual marble may be heavier or lighter than the others. How can you identify it and determine whether it is heavy or light?
Answer: Number the marbles from 1 to 12. For the first weighing put marbles 1,2,3 and 4 on one side and marbles 5,6,7 and 8 on the other. The marbles will either they balance or not. If they balance, then the different marble is in group 9,10,11,12. Thus, we would put 1 and 2 on one side and 9 and 10 on the other. If these balance then the different marble is either 11 or 12. Weigh marble 1 against 11. If they balance, the different marble is number 12. If they do not balance, then 11 is the different marble. If 1 and 2 vs 9 and 10 do not balance, then the different marble is either 9 or 10. Again, weigh 1 against 9. If they balance, the different marble is number 10, otherwise, it is number 9. That was the easy part. What if the first weighing 1,2,3,4 vs 5,6,7,8 does not balance? Then any one of these marbles could be a different marble. Now, in order to proceed, keep track of which side is heavy for each of the following weighings. Suppose that 5,6,7 and 8 is the heavy side. We now weigh 1,5 and 6 against 2,7 and 8. If they balance, then the different marble is either 3 or 4. Weigh 4 against 9, a known good marble. If they balance then the different marble is 3 or 4. Then, if 1,5 and 6 vs 2,7 and 8 do not balance, and 2,7,8 is the heavy side, then either 7 or 8 is a different, heavy marble, or 1 is a different, light marble. For the third weighing, weigh 7 against 8. Whichever side is heavy is the different marble. If they balance, then 1 is the different marble. Should the weighing of 1,5 and 6 vs 2,7 and 8 show 1,5,6 to be the heavy side, then either 5 or 6 is a different heavy marble or 2 is a light different marble. Weigh 5 against 6. The heavier one is the different marble. If they balance, then 2 is a different light marble.
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