When Geeks Tweet.

[lexipixel]

Thought this was a classic -- it got retweeted onto my twitter feed:

@Rogueactor Tom Lupien
So an SEO expert walks into a bar... ...pub, grill, tavern, sports bar, public house, Irish pub, bartender, drinks, beer, wine, liquor

[lucy24]

As long as we're walking into bars...

Three logicians walk into a bar. Bartender says "Do you all want a beer?"
First logician says, "I don't know."
Second logician says, "I don't know."
Third logician says, "Yes."

I did not get this right away, but I got it in the end.

Idle query: Does there exist any professional group whose jokes make normal people laugh?

[lexipixel]

Logically, the only reason all three would even walk into a bar is to drink beer, and only the third to reply could answer for all three -- but then again, they could have been non-drinkers and only there for karaoke night.

[lexipixel]

Idle query: Does there exist any professional group whose jokes make normal people laugh?
-lucy24

...professional comedians.

[johnhh]

reminds me of an old one

you are walking down a path , the path splits into two, one way is dangerous, one way is safe. Each possible path has a guardian, one that tells the truth and one that lies.

What question do you ask to make sure you choose the safe path ?

[lexipixel]

It is old. I won't spoil it -- but I'll just say they will both give the same answer.

[Yulia from DNP]

Is is road dangerous?.....NOOOOOOT? *borat*

[lexipixel]

Is is road dangerous?..

No. The question has do with truth and untruth, deductive reasoning and the mathematics of a double negative.

e.g.- "This is not, not true" means "This is true.".

[rocknbil]

lol . . . cracks me up to see programming logic like

if (! $is_not_logged_in && ! (username =~ /[^a-z]/i)) {
print "OK that's what it's not, but what IS it?";
}

<BTT>

if ($enter_bar) {
switch (beer) {
case none:
die;
default: gohome;
}

</BTT>

[Lapizuli]

This is hard! I tried these and they didn't work - aargh:

Is it false that the path is safe? (result is still one says safe, one dangerous, neither trusted)

Are you lying that the path is safe? (only possible answer for both is "no," but still neither trusted)

Are you lying about lying that the path is safe? (No possible answer exists for either truth-sayer or liar)

[edited by: Lapizuli at 7:30 pm (utc) on Jan 31, 2012]

[Lapizuli]

Ooh - I thought I finally got the logician joke but now I'm not sure:

Do you all want a beer?
First says dunno
Second says dunno
Third assumes that either they all want a beer or they all don't? And since he wants one, they must all want a beer?

Or is it that a dunno response is equivocal?

Or...or...what am I missing?

[ofnimira]

If either the first or second had not wanted a beer, they would have said 'no' rather than 'dunno'

[Lapizuli]

Thank you, ofnimira!

Fun to use this as a "what thinking-process do you use" test...!

I just told this to my husband, who had just woken up, and it took him a second to get it. A second, whereas I, wide-awake and furiously trying to think with linear logic - always a stretch for me - wrestled with it for ten minutes and still didn't get it. Oddly, now that I get it after your explanation, I think it's absolutely hilarious, whereas my spouse is still waiting for the punch line.

[lexipixel]

lol . . . cracks me up to see programming logic like

if (! $is_not_logged_in && ! (username =~ /[^a-z]/i)) {
print "OK that's what it's not, but what IS it?";
}
-rocknbil

ok.. since you brought up code, I'll give the answer to the "which path is safe" riddle... but ask if anyone can code the logic, (I tried, it hurt my brain).

A road splits into two paths.
One is safe to travel, one is not.
There is a guardian at the head of each path.
One guardian always tells the truth, the other always lies.
What single question do you ask each to find out which is the safe path?

The question is: "Which path would the other guardian say you would say is safe?"

If Path "A" is guarded by Guard "A", and he tells the truth, he will tell you that Guard "B" will tell you Guard "A" would say Path "B" is safe while Guard "B" will lie and tell you that Guard "A" will tell you Path "B" is safe.

They both will answer "Path B", so you will know that Path "A" is actually the safe path.

Code that.

[lucy24]

"If I ask you if this path is safe, what will you answer?"

"If ask you if this path is safe, will you say {}?"

Almost anything will do, so long as it elicits a double negative:

statement about safety of path + statement about statement = actual safety of path
_____

Very, very, very old riddle:

"We carried away all that we did not catch, and all that we caught we left behind."

There is an obvious www version. Similar question, updated answer :)

[lexipixel]

"If I ask you if this path is safe, what will you answer?"

"If ask you if this path is safe, will you say {}?"

Almost anything will do, so long as it elicits a double negative

-lucy24

No.

Using your question:

Question: If I ask you if this path is safe, what will you answer?

Path A / Guard A's answer: Yes. (truthful)

Path B / Guard B's answer: Yes. (liar)

How could you know from that?

You could not know the answer unless you ask each the specific question "Which path will the other guard say is safe?", and then choose the opposite path.

[Kate_Oranum]

YOU KNOW YOU'RE ADDICTED TO THE INTERNET WHEN...

&#8226; Your bookmarks takes 15 minutes to scroll from top to bottom.

&#8226; You step out of your room and realize that your parents have moved and you don't have a clue when it happened.

&#8226; All of your friends have an @ in their names.

&#8226; You've already visited all the links at Yahoo and you're halfway through Excite.

&#8226; You check your mail. It says "no new messages." So you check it again.

&#8226; Your phone bill is delivered in a box.

&#8226; You wake up at 3 a.m. to go to the bathroom and stop and check your e-mail on the way back to bed.

&#8226; The last girl you picked up was only a jpeg.

&#8226; You forget what year it is.

&#8226; You begin to wonder how on earth your service provider is allowed to call 200 hours per month "unlimited."

[lexipixel]

YOU KNOW YOU'RE ADDICTED TO THE INTERNET WHEN...
-Kate_Oranum

...the page that list was cut-and-pasted from is 10 years old.


...(and you really shouldn't "lift" content from a website and repost it without attribution -- in less polite ways that is called "scraping" and copyright infringement).

[lucy24]

Question: If I ask you if this path is safe, what will you answer?

Path A / Guard A's answer: Yes. (truthful)

Path B / Guard B's answer: Yes. (liar)

How could you know from that?

Your question is not "Is this path safe?" It is "What would you say if I asked?" Guard B therefore lies twice: "I would say yes" = He would really say No = The path is safe. And vice versa.

You know you're addicted to the Internet when you have a decimal-to-hexadecimal converter bookmarked, telling you that 8226 = x2022 = bullet.

[lexipixel]

"What would you say if I asked?" Guard B therefore lies twice: "I would say yes" = He would really say No = The path is safe. And vice versa.

-lucy24

I still don't think you are getting it...

1. You can only ask one question (the same question) of both guards.

2. You don't know which guard is the liar or which tells the truth, (and the one that lies always lies -- he would not tell the truth, e.g. use reverse psychology.

Only by asking "Which path would the other guardian say you would say is safe?" can you know to take the opposite path to the one they both say the other would say is safe.

But I am growing tired of this.

...all this "Is it safe?" talk reminds me of Laurence Olivier's character as he's working on Dustin Hoffman's teeth in the movie Marathon Man.

[imdb.com...]

[johnhh]

You don't know which guard is the liar or which tells the truth

ho ho - its a Polish logic problem
If you ask "if I ask the other guardian what is the safe path " .. what will his answer be?

Polish logic .. look it up

Or just to confuse you

He says to her "I love you " then she dies ...whats the situation

[lexipixel]

Polish logic .. look it up

Interesting. And RPN seems to get the problem closer to a mathematical solution -- but I still can't figure out how to convert from a word problem to an equation.

He says to her "I love you " then she dies ...whats the situation

...no clue, brain still hurts from trying to figure out how to proof the path problem.

[lexipixel]

"We carried away all that we did not catch, and all that we caught we left behind."
-lucy24

Nothing was caught.

[lucy24]

It doesn't matter how many were caught. The riddle is: what was caught? Or not caught, as the case may be.

[bhonda]

Your question is not "Is this path safe?" It is "What would you say if I asked?" Guard B therefore lies twice: "I would say yes" = He would really say No = The path is safe. And vice versa.

Hey Lucy - don't worry, I get that one. That definitely works!

[akmac]

Arrows?

[johnhh]

"We carried away all that we did not catch, and all that we caught we left behind."

give up - brain hurts !

[lexipixel]

"We carried away all that we did not catch, and all that we caught we left behind."

lice

[brotherhood of LAN]

"We carried away all that we did not catch, and all that we caught we left behind."

kinda sounds like .htaccess

[lucy24]

Nice one, lexi, that's it. Or fleas, or ectoparasite of your choice.

And you beat me to it, LAN, because that's exactly what I've been thinking. "We opened the door to all we did not recognize, and all that we recognized we left outside." :)