Re: Riddle: 40 Pounds In The Balance 1, 3, 9, 27... So, put 9 and 27 on one side for 36, then put 1 on the other side for 35. For 34 put 9, 27, and 1 on one side for 37, then put 3 on the other side for 34
Re: Riddle: 40 Pounds In The Balance For 34 - put the 27+9+1 on one side and 3 on the other For 35 - put 27+9 on one side and 1 on the other
Re: Riddle: 40 Pounds In The Balance Sorry I am late posting yes as they both said above this is a two sided scale and it never stated you couldn't add weights to either side even if the ball was on it. I was tasked working out this a few years back when I was still in school in a maths lesson. I was one of the only people to work it out. It takes a bit of time to work out the numbers but the concept is pretty easy to understand
Re: Riddle: 40 Pounds In The Balance You obviously need all odd numbers for the solution, so that takes out 50% of the possible ones, you also know 1 has to be a number... Then you go from there
Re: Riddle: 40 Pounds In The Balance I never worked out if this is possible but I am sure there is a method using all even numbers too. For example for 1 you could use a 2 weight. If the 2 is heavier then you know the weight is 1. If you found out on another example that 30 was too light and 32 too heavy you would know the answer is 31. I might look into this example later.
Re: Riddle: 40 Pounds In The Balance That may work need to figure out 4 even numbers and check if they work for all cases 2 has to be one of them... With possibly 6,14,28 as others
Re: Riddle: 40 Pounds In The Balance The weight should be 1,3,9,27 Lbs With the 1lb weight alone you can only determine a mystery ball of weight 1 lb. With 1 and 3 lb weight alone U can determine mysteryball of between 1 and 4 lbs. With 9lbs weight in the mix,we can now determined the weight of a mystery ball between 1 and 13 lbs. and finally with 27lb weight we can determined any weight between 1 and 40 lb. i solved this one few weeks ago my friend gave it to me.
Re: Riddle: 40 Pounds In The Balance That answer is already given...we are debating if it can be done with all even numbers and on the basis of deduction and elimination like if the weight is less than 2 then it must be 1 and similarly other odd weights
Re: Riddle: 40 Pounds In The Balance Hmm... I guess you could do all even numbers if you used that method... I'll see if I can think of it as well
Re: Riddle: 40 Pounds In The Balance Solution: The weights should be 1, 3, 9, and 27 lbs. you are correct. With the 1 lb weight alone, You can only determine a mystery ball of weight 1 lb. With the 1 and 3 lb weights alone, you can determine a mystery ball of between 1 and 4 lbs. For example, if the mystery ball weighed 4 lbs, you could determine this by putting the 1 and 3 lb weights on one side of the balance, and the mystery ball on the other side. As another example, if the mystery ball weighed 2 lbs, you could determine this by putting the 3 lb weight on one side of the balance, and the mystery ball plus the 1 lb weight on the other side. With the 9 lb weight in the mix, we can now determine the weights of a mystery ball between 1 and 13 lbs. And finally, with the 27 lb weight, we can determine any weight between 1 and 40 lbs.
Or what is referred to as a cow. Which should be the correct answer. 4 feet (4 sprang), 4 udders (4 hang), 2 horns (to ward off dogs), 2 eyes (to lead the way), and a tail (which is always rather dirty)