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Topic: Naming Sons (Read 938 times) |
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Whiskey Tango Foxtrot
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Naming Sons
« on: Oct 20th, 2006, 8:18pm » |
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A father and his eleven unnamed sons live on a farm by themselves. One day, the father decides to name his sons. He chooses to use numbers formed from the letters of his name to produce his childrens' names. His name can be found in a common English dictionary. He has eleven sons and each will be given a different name.
When all is done, his sons are named: 3, 8, 9, 10, 13, 30, 39, 80, 89, 90, 98.
What is the father's name?
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| « Last Edit: Oct 21st, 2006, 2:19pm by Whiskey Tango Foxtrot » |
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jollytall
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Re: Naming Sons
« Reply #1 on: Oct 20th, 2006, 11:42pm » |
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I can imagine many names:
Maybe his name is also a number, so the letters of his name are numbers. If he can use them in any permutations, then the smallest "name" is 13890.
If he wanted to use them as substrings of his name, then he had a long name.
If he really uses the letters of his name and can use them multiple times, then his name is at least 166. If for one son he cannot use the same letter twice then his name does not exist.
But maybe he is simply the 10th civil lived in that old empire.
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Whiskey Tango Foxtrot
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Re: Naming Sons
« Reply #2 on: Oct 21st, 2006, 7:36am » |
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Clarifications, then:
His name is constructed with letters, not numbers.
Each of his son's names can only use a single letter from their father's names to produce a single letter in their names.
I won't give an example (at least for now) as the first step of the problem is by far the hardest part.
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sofeffi
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Re: Naming Sons
« Reply #3 on: Oct 21st, 2006, 9:03am » |
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so, the letters needed are:
threeignntyi
if I understand correctly, that is.
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sofeffi
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Re: Naming Sons
« Reply #4 on: Oct 21st, 2006, 10:51am » |
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Is the fathers name a number or a real name I wonder. If its a real name, are surnames included?
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chicken
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Re: Naming Sons
« Reply #5 on: Oct 21st, 2006, 10:56am » |
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i bet his name is just like edward or something
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sofeffi
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Re: Naming Sons
« Reply #6 on: Oct 21st, 2006, 11:24am » |
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probably
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Whiskey Tango Foxtrot
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Re: Naming Sons
« Reply #7 on: Oct 21st, 2006, 2:17pm » |
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on Oct 21st, 2006, 10:51am, sofeffi wrote:| Is the fathers name a number or a real name I wonder. If its a real name, are surnames included? |
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There are no surnames included, but the father's name might not be a name, so to speak. That is, it may be a word, instead. I should probably have been more clear on this point and will edit the riddle accordingly. Thanks.
on Oct 21st, 2006, 10:56am, chicken wrote:| i bet his name is just like edward or something |
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How much?
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Grimbal
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Re: Naming Sons
« Reply #8 on: Oct 21st, 2006, 3:13pm » |
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I wouldn't call him extremely smart.
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TimMann
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Re: Naming Sons
« Reply #9 on: Oct 21st, 2006, 8:43pm » |
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on Oct 21st, 2006, 7:36am, Whiskey Tango Foxtrot wrote:Each of his son's names can only use a single letter from their father's names to produce a single letter in their names.
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Your clarification is confusing me. Are you saying that a son's name can't use the same letter from the father's name twice? If you *don't* mean that, this answer looks nice:
Nightery
p.s. I found this by hand. Checking with grep over the /usr/share/dict/words file on my system, it seems to be the only solution with no repeated or extraneous letters.
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| « Last Edit: Oct 21st, 2006, 9:20pm by TimMann » |
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TimMann
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Re: Naming Sons
« Reply #10 on: Oct 21st, 2006, 9:18pm » |
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OK, maybe you do mean that a son can't use the same letter twice. That explains Grimbal's remark, as with a lot of help from grep I found these possibilities in the copy of /usr/dict/words on my system:
hyperintelligent
hyperpigmentation
interchangeability
pharyngoepiglottidean
resynthetizing
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Whiskey Tango Foxtrot
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Re: Naming Sons
« Reply #11 on: Oct 21st, 2006, 11:16pm » |
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Correct! TimMann you get full marks! Although Grimbal, you get first prize for finding the initial solution. Sorry for not catching it immediately, but it's Saturday night and you know....
P.S. I can't believe I spell-checked this so thoroughly.
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revenge
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Re: Naming Sons
« Reply #12 on: Nov 14th, 2006, 6:49am » |
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on Oct 21st, 2006, 9:18pm, TimMann wrote:OK, maybe you do mean that a son can't use the same letter twice. That explains Grimbal's remark, as with a lot of help from grep I found these possibilities in the copy of /usr/dict/words on my system:
hyperintelligent
hyperpigmentation
interchangeability
pharyngoepiglottidean
resynthetizing
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So how do these names translate themselves into the 11 numbers 
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Grimbal
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Re: Naming Sons
« Reply #13 on: Nov 14th, 2006, 12:49pm » |
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on Nov 14th, 2006, 6:49am, revenge wrote:
So how do these names translate themselves into the 11 numbers
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Well, Three, Eight, Nine, Ten, Thirteen, ...
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