Today's puzzle is from Britain's greatest puzzle-maker, Henry Dudeney. I remember getting it wrong the first time I tried it, but it teaches a valuable lesson: don't be distracted by superfluous details.
"Here is a little tangle that is perpetually cropping up in various guises. A cyclist bought a bicycle for £15 and gave in payment a cheque for £25. The seller went to a neighboring shopkeeper and got him to cash the cheque for him, and the cyclist, having received his £10 change, mounted the machine and disappeared. The cheque proved to be valueless, and the salesman was requested by his neighbor to refund the amount he had received. To do this, he was compelled to borrow the £25 from a friend, as the cyclist forgot to leave his address, and could not be found. Now, as the bicycle cost the salesman £11, how much money did he lose altogether?"
So, I'm thoroughly confused, but I'll give it a shot.
ReplyDeleteSeller -£11 for buying the bicycle
Seller -£10 for paying cyclist in change
The £25 evens out as he received £25 then had to pay it back
So the Seller lost £21?
Ack. So confusing.
I'm assuming that he has to pay the friend back the £25 at some point. So there's the:
ReplyDelete£11 bicycle
£25 owed to a friend
£10 given in change
for a total of £46. Maybe?
Joshua got it right! The solution just went up. (EotF: that's the answer most people give, including my wife and me the first time I tried it.)
ReplyDeletehttp://sopgaming.blogspot.com/2010/08/monday-puzzle-solution-bicycle-thief.html