Ok a slightly easier one - or a more classical lateral thinking question anyway:
An explorer walks one mile due South, turns and walks one mile due East, turns again and walks one mile due North. He finds himself back where he started. He shoots a bear. What colour is the bear?
8 comments:
White - he's at the North Pole...
Ooh, clever girl....
Steve got it straight off and he has a stinking cold....
I thought this one might be easier.
Now the second part to the question - it there anywhere else in the world where these conditions fit and you can "walks one mile due South, turns and walks one mile due East, turns again and walks one mile due North. He finds himself back where he started. "
No, I wanted to write that, too, because you only mention THREE directions - with one mile in each of them - geographically you can only do that on the north pole end of the earth - on the south pole it would accordingly be one mile north, one mile east (or west) and one mile south. On all other locations on the earth (further than one mile to the poles of course) you would walk a SQUARE, not a TRIANGLE, therefore you'd need another mile into the fourth direction before you landed on the same spot.
And the polar bear was easy because there are NO polar bears on the southern hemisphere (and respectively also to mention that there ar NO penguins on the northern hemisphere :-) )
The answer is mathematical again .... you start from any point on a circle drawn around the south pole at 1.16 miles (1 + 1/2pi miles). This distance is slightly more than the mile to take into account the curvature of the Earth.
Then you walk one mile South towards the Pole, your walk one mile to the East will take you one a complete circle around the Pole and then you retrace your steps North to where you started from :)
However - there are no Bears at the South Pole :)
Well, I didn't look at it mathematically (of course - seeing as I'm mathematically rather challenged), but I can see the reasoning.
Other than that I'd say that I was spot on :-D
The way I heard this one is exempt from maths: if you are in a house with all southern exposures, and a bear is in your front yard, what color is the bear? Comes out the same, but without all that walking :) It's freaking cold out there, after all! Not to mention, polar bears can eat people LOL
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