Saving Private Ryan !
"Take exactly one tablet of medicine A and one of medicine B each day, lest you will die from either disease or overdosage" were the exact words of the doctor. "These tablets must be taken together and you need all of these", the last sentence he said before parting.
"The doctor is gone but, i do have bottles for each" thought Ryan. He took one of the tablet A in his hand, while tilting the bottle of tablet B, two tablets accidentally fall out. Now there are three tablets in his hand. Because both types look identical, he cannot tell which is which.
Can you help Ryan save his dosage and his life?
"The doctor is gone but, i do have bottles for each" thought Ryan. He took one of the tablet A in his hand, while tilting the bottle of tablet B, two tablets accidentally fall out. Now there are three tablets in his hand. Because both types look identical, he cannot tell which is which.
Can you help Ryan save his dosage and his life?
Labels: logic, outside-the-box
posted by Rajesh Lal at
9:35 AM
21 Comments:
OOOOK
my solution:
you have 1 of Pill "A" and 2 of Pill "B". you can't just toss them away cuz then you'll have uneven amounts at the end and you die.
what you dois take 2 more pill A's place them aside.. label them in case dumbdumb ryan thinks their candy... and you take one more pill B and place it to the side also (a different side, and labeld differnt) ..
with the three pills from the start cut each piece into thirds. so you have 9 slices... 3 are A 6 are B (keep each pill seperated so u don't mix which pill a slice came from). with the 2 pill A's on the side you cut those into thirds also. do the same with the single pill B on the side...
you eat one slice from each initial pill. so you are now guarenteed to have 1/3 A a nd 2/3 B. so with the ones clearly labeld A, you eat 2/3's of a pill and also 1/3 of the Pill B.
do this the next day... 1/3 of each starting pill, 2/3 of A, 1/3 of B, and do it one final time, and all those pills are gone, and you are left with only the pills labeled still in the bottle.
hopefully doofus doesn't mix them all toghether though... that would suck for him.
I really like your solution, but my only question is why you chose to cut the pills in thirds, rather than halves.
In Ryan's hand are three pills: 2 B's and 1 A. If he breaks each pill in half, and separates the halves into two piles as he splits them, then he will have two piles, each with three half-pills: 2 half-B's, and 1 half-A. Next, he can take a whole pill out of bottle A, break that one in half, and put each half on one of the piles. Now, each pile is one day's dose, and he can take one pile today, and one tomorrow. Starting on the third day, he should try to be more careful with his medication.
doh.... yea your right. i tried with splitting it in half first, but using some other method that didn't work... then i moved to thirds with this other method.. that didn't work either.. and i thought of this one.. and i was still workin in thirds so yea...
Assuming the bottles initially had the same number of pills, just dump the pills out and count them. The one with the extra pill is "A".
In your hand = 1A+2B
Add 1 Pill A = 2A+2B
Split the 4 Pill in hand to 1/2
Take 1/2 of each pill every day=
1/2A+1/2A+1/2B+1/2B=A+B
Aren't there any refills? I mean if he got to take one of eah everyday wouldnt there be refills?
What Ryan should do is get another pill from bottle A, and completely grind all four pills. Then he can mix all four pills and dissolve half the powder in whater, that should count as a dose, and save the other half for the next day.
Why doesn't he just trash all three and take a new tablet out of each bottle?
becayuse the doctor is "gone" and he has to complete his dosage to "live"
All Ryan has to do is weigh a tablet from each bottle. After weighing the tablets, grab both bottles along with a mortar and pestal. Toss the three tablets in the bowl plus the two he removed, empty both bottles into the bowl, then thoroughly crush all. Mix them together. Continue to mix the powder until it is completely and thoroughly mixed. Separate the powder into equal amounts, each weighing the total of the two tablets.
Problem solved.
either of the splitting pills options would work but i would contradict the 'mortar and pestle' version due to the fact it is impossible to create a perfect Mixture. you can pull out two equal samples from the mixture and i will guarantee that they will both have different amounts of each chemical. Chem 101. (actually i believe that may even be learned in biology nowadays)
ok it is easy!
just take another pill A so you have 2 pills of each doesnt matter if you know which is which! Cut each pill in half and then take half of each pill one day and the other half of the pills the next day!
Anonymous guy, that answer sounds really familiar, I feel like I've heard it somewhere before.
lol. nice anon. 2. yeah the power of reading is great. bet hes glad someone taught him.
two pills fell out of bottle b. wouldnt the two b's be closest to the bottle? just take one of them and put back in the bottle
well anonymous, he is dying, crazy, and probably severely deranged. i for one doubt that he can see or concentrate hard enough to notice that. he prob closed his fist and started to take them when he realized what happened. no lets hope hes sane enough to follow our advice about splitting the pills
WOW I thought the solution was really simple. If he's taking one of each pill, then he should have an equal amount of each pill, so whichever one has one missing is the one extra in his hand. Take one from the bottle that will make a=b, then throw the 4 pills away. If he's really terminal, he should go to a chemist to find out the ingredients of the pills, then dye all the B pills so he doesn't make the same mistake again.
Also, sadly, if the doctor is the only one who can make the pills, he's still gonna die when the pills run out.
what he should do is take another tablet of A out of the bottle, gring all 4 pills to a powder, mix them thoroughly, and eat half the mixture today, and half tomorrow.
grind*
Okay, seeing as how he knows that there are two of the B pill and oe of the A pill, all he would have to do is add another A pill and grind them up, or dissolve them in water and divide that into two, one for today and one for tomorrow.
ANSWER
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You have = 1A+2B
Add 1 Pill of A = 2A+2B
Split the 4 Pill in hand to 1/2
put half of each split into bin1
and the otehr half to bin2
have bin1 the first day and bin2 the second day
GOT RIGHT
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Daniel, Ydrameos
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