This will make your head spin:The Hardest Logic Puzzle Ever

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Tdarcos
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This will make your head spin:The Hardest Logic Puzzle Ever

Post by Tdarcos »

This is the sort of thing that can give headaches. Someone solved "The Hardest Logic Puzzle Ever."
The Hardest Logic Puzzle Ever goes like this:

Three gods A, B, and C are called, in some order, True, False, and Random. True always speaks truly, False always speaks falsely, but whether Random speaks truly or falsely is a completely random matter. Your task is to determine the identities of A, B, and C by asking three yes-no questions; each question must be put to exactly one god. The gods understand English, but will answer all questions in their own language, in which the words for “yes” and “no” are “da” and “ja,” in some order. You do not know which word means which.


Here's the article on how it's solved: https://getpocket.com/explore/item/how- ... t-newtab0x
If you're interested in the "Law of excluded middle," discussed in the article, see this: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_excluded_middle
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AArdvark
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Re: This will make your head spin:The Hardest Logic Puzzle Ever

Post by AArdvark »

Is this one of those trick puzzles? Like, there are no gods so don't talk to any of them kind of thing?

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Flack
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Re: This will make your head spin:The Hardest Logic Puzzle Ever

Post by Flack »

It took me years to understand the two-person version (which appeared in Labyrinth). That version goes like this: there are two people guarding doors; one is the one you want and the other leads to certain death. One of the guards always tells the truth and one always lies, but you don't know which is which. You can only ask one guard one question. The solution is to ask one guard which door the other guard would say is the good door, and then choose the opposite because it's guaranteed that one of them is lying. So if guard A says guard B would pick door #1, either guard A is lying (and guard B would have said door #2), or guard B is lying (and would have given you the wrong answer).

The one Tdarcos posted is infinitely more complex and has to do with asking questions that have multiple parts, like "if and only if A is true, what would you say about B" and so on. I get it, but I don't get it. I get that the complex questions eventually force the gods to give you answers that can eventually be dissected, but I don't get it to the point where I could solve it.
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The Happiness Engine
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Re: This will make your head spin:The Hardest Logic Puzzle Ever

Post by The Happiness Engine »

But WHAT IF... I just walked away and went and got some BBQ? Being a complex person surely it's more important that as the narrator AND protagonist that I just advance the story.

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