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Topic: FINDING AGES OF DAUGHTERS (Read 438 times) |
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polkartheek
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FINDING AGES OF DAUGHTERS
« on: Jun 7th, 2008, 5:52am » |
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Two MIT math graduates bump into each other. They hadn’t seen each other in over 20 years.
The first grad says to the second: “how have you been?”
Second: “Great! I got married and I have three daughters now”
First: “Really? how old are they?”
Second: “Well, the product of their ages is 72, and the sum of their ages is the same as the number on that building over there..”
First: “Right, ok.. oh wait.. I still don’t know”
second: “Oh sorry, the oldest one just started to play the piano”
First: “Wonderful! my oldest is the same age!” Problem: How old are the daughters?
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Jigsaw
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Re: FINDING AGES OF DAUGHTERS
« Reply #1 on: Jun 7th, 2008, 9:36am » |
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Enumerate the possible ways in which 72 can be written as products of 3 numbers.
8,3,3
6,6,2
8,9,1
etc. . .
Now note the following statement Quote:| Right, ok.. oh wait.. I still don’t know |
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The number(sum) should have been 14 since only in that case you have 2 ways in which you can write 3 nums such that their product is 72 and sum is 14- (6,6,2) and (8,3,3). All other triples when added give unique sum. Since he's mentioned that his "oldest daughter" plays piano, you're left with only (8,3,3).
[edited a typo]
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| « Last Edit: Jun 8th, 2008, 2:13am by jagatsastry » |
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