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Topic: A Fool And His Money (Read 532 times) |
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Jeremiah Smith
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A Fool And His Money
« on: Sep 25th, 2003, 11:51am » |
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Hey all... haven't been here in forever, but I have returned with a simple puzzle I came across a few days ago. (I searched for it, but it doesn't appear to have been posted while I was gone):
The residents of a certain village enjoy pointing out the antics of the local village fool to passing travellers. The villagers will offer the fool a choice between a shiny 50-cent coin and a beaten-up dollar bill. Invariably, the fool will take the shiny coin despite the fact that it's worth less, and the visitor and the residents will walk off laughing heartily. Why on earth would the fool always take the 50-cent piece, even though he knows that the bill is worth more?
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towr
wu::riddles Moderator
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Some people are average, some are just mean.
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Re: A Fool And His Money
« Reply #1 on: Sep 25th, 2003, 1:58pm » |
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because people will keep giving him 50 cent coins if he does this. And multiple 50 cent coins are worth more than one measily dollar.
So actually a coin is worth more, since part of the value lies in the continuation of the cycle
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| « Last Edit: Sep 25th, 2003, 1:59pm by towr » |
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Wikipedia, Google, Mathworld, Integer sequence DB
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James Fingas
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Re: A Fool And His Money
« Reply #2 on: Sep 26th, 2003, 8:24am » |
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Because he knows that he and his money will soon go their separate ways ... and it will be easier to say goodbye to 50 cents than to a dollar.
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Speaker
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Re: A Fool And His Money
« Reply #3 on: Sep 26th, 2003, 5:44pm » |
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The fool, no fool he, is actually an accomplished student of advanced monetary economics, who understands that the economy of his village will soon be taken off the silver standard causing uncontrolled hyper-inflation reducing the value of paper money to little more than the paper it is printed on. Consequently the value of his hoard of silver coins will skyrocket allowing him to live comfortably for the rest of his life.
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They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. <Ben Franklin>
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Nomnolence
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Nope, it's because people are stupid enough to carry on giving him 50c to marvel his apparent stupidity.
Therefore, the fool is not a fool, only the travellers are 
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Nomnolence
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To make it plainer, if he took the 1$, nobody would give him money any more.
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harpanet
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Posts: 109
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Re: A Fool And His Money
« Reply #6 on: Oct 18th, 2003, 6:27am » |
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In addition, over time, residents and visitors are going to start baiting him with $5 bills and then $10 etc. Once he has convinced them that he is so dumb they'll start offering $100 bills. Once sufficient people reach that level on a continual basis he will suddenly switch tactics and take as many $100 bills as he can before word gets around, and then skip town.
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Icarus
wu::riddles Moderator
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Re: A Fool And His Money
« Reply #7 on: Oct 18th, 2003, 5:47pm » |
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Nomnolence, If you highlight Towr's post, you will see that he gave the same answer. Whenever you find blank areas in these forums, there is probably hidden text in them. We do this so that when people first see the question, they don't see the answer right below it as the same time - so that they have a chance to think it out themselves.
Also, for tougher puzzles, you can give hints for those who just want a push in the right direction.
To hide text, use the hide tag: [hide] [/hide].
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"Pi goes on and on and on ...
And e is just as cursed.
I wonder: Which is larger
When their digits are reversed? " - Anonymous
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