A couple of months ago, it was a color-changing dress that blew out the neural circuits of the Internet. Though it may not have quite the mass appeal, this week it is a math problem that is making bushels of brains hurt.
It started with a posting on Facebook, by Kenneth Kong, a television host in Singapore
From there, people around the world have been trying to figure out Cheryl’s birthday, or at least wondering why she couldn’t she just save everyone a lot of trouble and be more direct with Albert and Bernard.?
The wording of the problem is terrible, so here is a clearer version, that makes some of the assumptions more obvious but which does not change any of the underlying logic of the problem:
Originally, Mr. Kong said this was a problem inflicted on fifth-graders, leading to hand-wringing that Singapore children were way better at math than the everyone else in the world and worries that Singapore children were being mentally abused with convoluted logic at a young age.
It turned out the problem actually came from a math olympiad test for math-savvy high school-age students.
How would you fare in a room full of adolescent math competitors in Singapore??
(Once you think you have figured it out — or if you don’t know where to start — here is the answer and an explanation.)
- http://bit.ly/1CFl7Z8
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