Web Puzzles

It's everybody's fate, but unfortunately for you today it's yours. You die and wander through a long tunnel towards a light. But, wait a second, that's not white light? It's crimson red!

Indeed, going through the gate at the end you face an enormous deity, cloaked in flames, holding a gigantic trident in one hand. On this trident you can make out two bodies speared to it... beads of sweat start to form on your forehead, and they're not from the heat that's omnipresent in this room.
"Hahaha", the Devil laughs, "don't be afraid. You won't necessarily end up like them... they're just the souls of Mickey and Tung. They sold them to me in exchange for the ability to create awesome websites, or something like that, never kept contact with them though... Now, the fact you're here is that this millennium it's my turn to decide who goes to Heaven and who goes to Hell. St. Peter really needed that 1000 year vacation, so I'm on duty now. Since I'm the boss, I get to decide who goes where. And, to be completely honest, this 'Good/Bad'behaviour thingy... it's a bit outdated, isn't it ?


Instead, I would like to read some poetry to you."

And so the Devil starts to recite :

Evil am I.
Evil,
as so to die not sane.

Menace I lay.
A stab mocks.
I revolt.
No din is still.

I kidnap and I kill.
It's sin I don't love.
Risk combat.
Say a lie.

Cane men.
A stone I do toss!
Alive,
I'm alive.

"Now", the Devil says. "If you can point out the single most peculiar thing about this poem to me, I'll let you go and you can take that elevator over there.... what ? ... yeah yeah, the one with hostesses dressed like poultry at its doors... now start thinking, 'cause I ain't got all day!".

Right at that moment you notice that there's still one spike unoccupied on Satan's trident...

What is so special about the Devil's poem?

Solution

There's a monastry of fifty monks that have taken a vow of silence. They go through the same routine every day. They wake up, pray. They go to lunch, their only meal of the day, were they all sit round a big circular table, and eat a simple meal. Then they go back to their rooms and pray. Then they fall asleep.

One day, the head monk of the area comes to visit. He's a bit different - he's allowed to talk and has a life outside the monastry. He tells them that there is currently a plague ravaging the land. People everywhere are dying. The disease manifests itself as red blotches on the forehead. The blotches are the only manifestation of the disease for three months, whereupon the next stage starts, a horribly painful death.

The head monk tells them that at least one of their midst will have the disease, probably more. Anybody with the disease should kill themselves, to save all of the pain and suffering. By killing themselves, they will restrict the movement of the disease, and will go to heaven. Anybody with the disease will show the first symptoms within a month. The chief monk then leaves. He returns two months later, to find that all of the infected monks have killed themselves, and they all did it on the same day.

Bear in mind the following:

• They have no mirrors or any other way of seeing themselves
• The blotches appear only on the forehead and cannot be seen by the monk
• Infected monks feel no different - the only manifestation of the first part of the disease are the blotches.
• The monks cannot talk to each other or in any other way communicate.
• Any monks with the disease will display the blotches within a month of the head monk leaving.
• At least one monk definitely has the disease.
• The monks only see each other once per day, at lunch, when they are all sat round the round table.
• These monks are brighter than the average monk....

How did they know whether or not they were infected and why did they all kill themselves on the same day?

Solution

Tom and Tim, time tested twice troublesome twins, entered the kitchen at ten o'clock on a Tuesday evening. "Mom, mom, look what I found" said Tom, waving a sheet of faded paper.

"No, I found it." said Tim.

"What is it, Tom?" Mom asks.

"I don't know, mom, but it talks about Genies."

"really?" she replied as she took the paper from him. It was a copy of the family geneaology she had been looking for so she could do some research. "where was it?"

"It was in that Bible on the mantle." said Tim, "Between page 588 and 589."

"No," said Tom, "it was between pages 1201 and 1202!"

Mom gave Tom a dirty look, and said to Tim, "thanks for finding this sweetie." She looks at Tom.

"Why did you lie to me, Tom?"

How did Mom know that Tom was lying?

Solution

"This," explained Colonel Nevskij to the Druggar of Bongo Ghango - chief of a large country by River Ghango - "is the Buttons Room."

"I've seen a room like this in Washington," replied the big Chief, smiling with satisfaction, "there too, you couldn't see a single button. The only ones I can see here are, uh.. hehe, the ones on your uniform, Colonel!"

"Ahah, comrade Druggar likes joking. But the buttons are here," replied the Soviet, pointing at a large panel at the end of the room, "they are behind that panel."

"A very large panel," observed the Chief, "much larger than the one at the White House: I presume there are more buttons here."

"Of course, comrade Druggar: in America, only a bunch of opportunistic capitalists has a saying in the big decisions, while here, uh, here is different: the entire Soviet community, through its representatives, takes part in the decision process of the Union."

"Any citizen could then come here and press the buttons?"

"Err, no, not exactly. If I tried to do it, the room would fill up with narcotic gas, an alarm would set off, and... Well, no need to talk about that. For each button there is a slot, into which a magnetic card must be inserted, to activate the corresponding button. Therefore, no card, no button. To launch the missiles, every button must be activated and pressed, and only a handful of comrades holds the magnetic cards, which of course, each of them has a different code from the others. The personalities holding the cards are the Secretary of the Communist Party, the President of the Praesidium, the Chief of the KGB, and five comrades, Heroes of the Soviet Union. The distribution - and here is the originality of our system - is such that the Secretary of the Party holds the complete set of codes, and so he can launch the missiles by himself; if the Secretary is not available, the missiles can be launched by the President of the Praesidium together with the Chief of the KGB, or by anyone of these two, together with any two of the five Heroes of the Union. If - Marx forbid - the Secretary, the President, and the Chief have all been victimised by an imperialistic attack, our nuclear response can be initiated by any four of the five Heroes of the Soviet Union; any four of them would be sufficient to have the entire set of magnetic cards to activate the buttons."

"So, how many buttons are there?" asked the Chief.

What is the minimum number of buttons, and how are they distributed?

Solution

"This is terrible," the customs officer shouted. "It's impossible to count all these people and animals that keep moving around constantly. I can't count the same number twice! There are zebras, lions, giraffes, horses, elephants, rhinos, tigers, cheetas, flamingos, storks, doves and hummingbirds! I can't keep them under control, I just can't!"

"Count the heads, officer," the circus owner advised. "Every animal has got a head and, as the documentation shows, I can count 112 of them."

"Count the legs, officer, that's the way," the clown said. "There are 310 legs; if you subtract the number of heads from the number of legs, you'll be able to tell how many bipeds and how many four-legged animals there are."

"Wait a second, I've just counted the legs just now, and there's 297 of them," the cook said.

"This is driving me mad," the officer muttered. "One of them tells me there are 112 heads, another one talks about 310 legs, and that mentally-disturbed cook tells me that the number of legs is only 297. How many animals, including humans, are there?

To be more precise, how many bipeds and how many four-legged animals are there? And is the cook completely mad?

Solution