# Conundrums: Post 'em. Solutions desired but not required.



## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Here is a conundrum that is currently on my mind:

I frequently will stick a cup of cold coffee in the microwave to heat it. I haven't kept a tally, but it seems about 19 out of 20 times the microwave stops with the cup handle at the back. Now this cannot be explained by chance as it should be a 50/50 on average, but this has been happening for several years now.


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## Taggart (Feb 14, 2013)

False analogy. Ideally, if you toss an honest coin you should get 50/50 heads and tails. There is nothing to stop you on a short run getting 19 heads or 19 tails. On a long run - 1000 plus tosses - then it should approximate to 50/50.

You stick a cup of coffee in with the handle facing you and set the timer. The turntable revolves. On average, for the time you have set, it covers X and a 1/2 revolutions so ends up with the handle facing backward. The odd time it didn't, you probably set the timer for a few seconds more or less so it covered either X or X+1 revolutions and ended up with the handle facing you. You could test that hypothesis by trying different heating times.


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

Two identical Mozart dolls are hanging on string tied to the ends of a stick. 
The stick is hanging on a third string tied to its centre. What happens when the right-hand Mozart doll is submerged in a glass of water? 

a. Nothing. 
b. The stick tilts down to the left. 
c. The stick tilts down the right


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

"What happens when the right-hand Mozart doll is submerged in a glass of water?"

It gets wet? Seriously a good question, one I can't answer. If it's cloth, I'd guess, nothing. The weight of the water absorbed is offset by the buoyancy of the water itself. But if the Mozart doll is (for instance) hollow plastic, that doll would rise and the other would sink.


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Taggart said:


> False analogy. Ideally, if you toss an honest coin you should get 50/50 heads and tails. There is nothing to stop you on a short run getting 19 heads or 19 tails. On a long run - 1000 plus tosses - then it should approximate to 50/50.
> 
> You stick a cup of coffee in with the handle facing you and set the timer. The turntable revolves. On average, for the time you have set, it covers X and a 1/2 revolutions so ends up with the handle facing backward. The odd time it didn't, you probably set the timer for a few seconds more or less so it covered either X or X+1 revolutions and ended up with the handle facing you. You could test that hypothesis by trying different heating times.


Yes, we certainly can get 19 heads on 20 coin tosses, but the likelihood of that is pretty small.

Good point about the time and the turntable. I do enter varying times, but there must be some consistency in my times. I will have to keep track of what I am doing and see what times turn the handles back out to me.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

It's really like the question of why the toast always falls on the floor buttered side down.


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## sospiro (Apr 3, 2010)

What happens to the Mozart doll if you microwave it?


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

sospiro said:


> What happens to the Mozart doll if you microwave it?


I tried that and it got hot but it will depend on what your Mozart doll is made of, and how many pins are in it......


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

sospiro said:


> What happens to the Mozart doll if you microwave it?


Do not try this at home!


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Taggart said:


> You stick a cup of coffee in with the handle facing you and set the timer. The turntable revolves. On average, for the time you have set, it covers X and a 1/2 revolutions so ends up with the handle facing backward.


Well it actually was quite simple. All I had to do is watch the cup turning and I discovered the turntable makes a complete revolution every 10 seconds. So all I have to do is simply make sure to enter a time with a zero as the last digit.

(edit: Thanks for helping me see the obvious. I apparently was trying too hard to figure it out.)


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## sospiro (Apr 3, 2010)

Florestan said:


> Well it actually was quite simple. All I had to do is watch the cup turning and I discovered the turntable makes a complete revolution every 10 seconds. So all I have to do is simply make sure to enter a time with a zero as the last digit.
> 
> (edit: Thanks for helping me see the obvious. I apparently was trying too hard to figure it out.)


To my constant and acute distress mine takes slightly less than 10 seconds to do one revolution so I have to set it for eg 33 seconds for the coffee cup handle to be at the front.


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Here's one. For the past 5-10 months my garage door has been acting funny. It has a new closer installed about 1.5 years ago. Sometimes it will not shut and I have to manually close it. This happens almost always in the morning and rarely in the evening. 

What is going on?

Of course I would call out the garage door fix it man, but it will likely close fine when he is there, he'll lube it, charge me $100 and go home. Then once is is gone, it will do it again.


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

^ You have an Evil early rising and early to bed (ERAETB) Mozart doll actively to work in your neighbourhood- You need to call a pest exterminator urgently, things can only get worse........... First the garage door.........


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

Florestan said:


> Here's one. For the past 5-10 months my garage door has been acting funny. It has a new closer installed about 1.5 years ago. Sometimes it will not shut and I have to manually close it. This happens almost always in the morning and rarely in the evening.
> 
> What is going on?
> 
> Of course I would call out the garage door fix it man, but it will likely close fine when he is there, he'll lube it, charge me $100 and go home. Then once is is gone, it will do it again.


How do you mean "manually?" On my garage door this means pulling the lever that detaches the mechanism completely.
If you mean you have to get out of the car and push the button in the garage, it means you probably have weak battery in your remote opener (and it recovers during the heat of the day, but gets thirsty overnight, drinks some Flint River water and starts dying.  )


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## Huilunsoittaja (Apr 6, 2010)

Conundrum I answered last night but curious what you guys think... how many 4-sided figures can be seen in this diagram?


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

MarkW said:


> How do you mean "manually?" On my garage door this means pulling the lever that detaches the mechanism completely.
> If you mean you have to get out of the car and push the button in the garage, it means you probably have weak battery in your remote opener (and it recovers during the heat of the day, but gets thirsty overnight, drinks some Flint River water and starts dying.  )


Manually by pulling the lever and then physically pulling down the door. The closer button I am using is hard wired so not a battery issue.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

A man who lives on the tenth floor takes the elevator down to the first floor every morning and goes to work. In the evening, he returns. On a rainy day, or if there are other people in the elevator, he goes to his floor directly. Otherwise, he goes to the seventh floor and walks up three flights of stairs to his apartment. 

Can you explain why?


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

KenOC said:


> A man who lives on the tenth floor takes the elevator down to the first floor every morning and goes to work. In the evening, he returns. On a rainy day, or if there are other people in the elevator, he goes to his floor directly. Otherwise, he goes to the seventh floor and walks up three flights of stairs to his apartment.
> 
> Can you explain why?


Yes.

The man is so small that he cannot reach the button for 10 - unless he has an umbrella, or can ask others to push it for him.


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## Pyotr (Feb 26, 2013)

Florestan said:


> Here's one. For the past 5-10 months my garage door has been acting funny. It has a new closer installed about 1.5 years ago. Sometimes it will not shut and I have to manually close it. This happens almost always in the morning and rarely in the evening.
> 
> What is going on?
> 
> Of course I would call out the garage door fix it man, but it will likely close fine when he is there, he'll lube it, charge me $100 and go home. Then once is is gone, it will do it again.


Had that happen to me a few years ago at a vacation home I was renting. Whenever I called the owner , by the time he arrived, it worked flawlessly. Figured out later that it was a humidity problem. On clear mornings with low humidity the garage door worked fine.


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## Belowpar (Jan 14, 2015)

Clic and it wil enlarge. Mistifying.


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## Metairie Road (Apr 30, 2014)

> Here's one. For the past 5-10 months my garage door has been acting funny. It has a new closer installed about 1.5 years ago. Sometimes it will not shut and I have to manually close it. This happens almost always in the morning and rarely in the evening.
> 
> What is going on?
> 
> Of course I would call out the garage door fix it man, but it will likely close fine when he is there, he'll lube it, charge me $100 and go home. Then once is is gone, it will do it again.


All materials expand or contract based on the ambient temperature and humidity. A properly installed garage door should allow for this expansion and contraction. Perhaps it wasn't correctly installed, or perhaps you bumped into the door and knocked it out of alignment.


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

Belowpar said:


> View attachment 89291
> 
> 
> Clic and it wil enlarge. Mistifying.




This has been used to produce infinite quantities of chocolate: link.


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## Wood (Feb 21, 2013)

Florestan said:


> Here's one. For the past 5-10 months my garage door has been acting funny. It has a new closer installed about 1.5 years ago. Sometimes it will not shut and I have to manually close it. This happens almost always in the morning and rarely in the evening.
> 
> What is going on?
> 
> Of course I would call out the garage door fix it man, but it will likely close fine when he is there, he'll lube it, charge me $100 and go home. Then once is is gone, it will do it again.


There is a man in the flat above the garage who watches breakfast TV but not evening tele.

A few decades ago I lived in a former granny flat above a garage. The house owner was an inventor who created a device which would open and close his garage by pressing a button from inside his car. I noticed that every time I turned on my b&w portable, his device didn't work. So for fun  I used to turn my tele on sometimes when he was getting or returning his car and enjoy the sound of his curses rising up from below. Playing mind games with ones landlord was a way to deal with the inevitable exploitation of being a tenant.


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## Wood (Feb 21, 2013)

Huilunsoittaja said:


> Conundrum I answered last night but curious what you guys think... how many 4-sided figures can be seen in this diagram?


24?????????????????


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

I can squeeze 25 out of it...


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## Wood (Feb 21, 2013)

KenOC said:


> I can squeeze 25 out of it...


Yes 25.......................


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Belowpar said:


> View attachment 89291
> 
> 
> Clic and it wil enlarge. Mistifying.


Well, a cheat of sorts, it seems.

https://www.quora.com/How-does-the-infinite-chocolate-bar-trick-work


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## Huilunsoittaja (Apr 6, 2010)

Wood said:


> Yes 25.......................


I counted 27  but actually the IQ test only had options for 25 or 28.


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## Metairie Road (Apr 30, 2014)

I still haven't figured this one out.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Anybody got mine in post #17? Art Rock, if you've got it, please go ahead and spill the beans.


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

I just want the infinite quantities of chocolate


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

KenOC said:


> Anybody got mine in post #17? Art Rock, if you've got it, please go ahead and spill the beans.


Already did (invisible ink).


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Art Rock said:


> Already did (invisible ink).


Ah. Thank you!

Here's one for the kids. A frog is at the bottom of a well ten feet deep. Every day he can climb two feet up the wall, but then slips a foot back. How many days does it take him to escape the well?


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## Pat Fairlea (Dec 9, 2015)

KenOC said:


> Ah. Thank you!
> 
> Here's one for the kids. A frog is at the bottom of a well ten feet deep. Every day he can climb two feet up the wall, but then slips a foot back. How many days does it take him to escape the well?


Being a smart frog, he waits until someone lowers a bucket into the well, hops into the bucket, and is transported to the top. Croaking his thanks, the frog hops out of the bucket and away ... to where he is eaten by a passing heron. 
The moral of this tale is that life is randomly unfair. Especially to frogs.
Sleep well, children.


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## Abraham Lincoln (Oct 3, 2015)

Why is Area 51 so terrifying? Everytime I look at what's inside, I always leave feeling frightened and helpless.


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