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Topic: Alien Abduction (Read 1070 times) |
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honkyboy
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Alien Abduction
« on: Apr 1st, 2006, 3:34am » |
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Poor Billy Bob has been abducted.
While asleep Billy Bob was "beamed up" , Star Trek style, into an alien space craft, and taken back to the alien's Earth like home planet of Plearth.
The aliens want to use Billy Bob in an experiment to test their new ultra-mega high speed computer.
During the "beaming" Billy Bob's molecular make up was mapped. Using this info, the aliens hope their new computer will be able to simulate Billy Bob faster than real time, and thus predict all of his future actions.
Billy Bob is kept in a prison cell with NOTHING but four walls, a locked door and a small window. Every day a folded piece of paper is slid under the door. On it is written either the number 1 or 2. Nothing Else.
Billy Bob is told to guess 1 or 2, if he ever correctly guesses the number he will be returned to Earth. Otherwise he must remain in the cell. The number on the paper is the number the computer predicts Billy Bob will say.
After many days of always guessing the wrong number, Billy Bob realizes the aliens must be somehow predicting his guesses. He thinks about his dilema and after several more days is finally able to return home.
What did Billy Bob do?
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| « Last Edit: Apr 1st, 2006, 3:38am by honkyboy » |
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Icarus
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Re: Alien Abduction
« Reply #1 on: Apr 1st, 2006, 7:10am » |
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After many days trapped in a room with no food, water, or restroom facilities, my guess is that the aliens decided to return the dead body...
However, I suppose the intended answer is more on the lines of he sets up a way to pick the number based on some random process, rather than his own choices. There are many ways he could accomplish this, such as masticating a few of those slips of paper and pressing the result into a "coin" to flip.
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honkyboy
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Re: Alien Abduction
« Reply #2 on: Apr 1st, 2006, 8:15am » |
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Truly nothing is allowed in the room with Billy Bob. The poor man is completely naked.
The piece of paper is used so that Billy Bob does not feel that he is being cheated, though he is allowed no contact with the paper. It is opened and removed via a mechanical arm.
There is also no direct contact with the aliens. Food is "beamed' directly to his belly and waste removed in the same manner.
Those Aliens are strange fellows.
(no offense to alien)
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towr
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Re: Alien Abduction
« Reply #3 on: Apr 1st, 2006, 8:30am » |
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If the simulation is at all times accurate, the only way he can escape is by introducing randomness.
Otherwise, he can hope for chaos to explode any difference untill he is sufficiently different from his simulation.
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Wikipedia, Google, Mathworld, Integer sequence DB
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Icarus
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Re: Alien Abduction
« Reply #4 on: Apr 2nd, 2006, 11:30am » |
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So Billy does his random process with his own body. As I said before, there are MANY ways he could do this!
Bite off a nail and flip it, basing his answer on how it lands.
Spin around until he is so dizzy that he falls down, basing his answer on how he lands.
Etc.
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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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honkyboy
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Re: Alien Abduction
« Reply #5 on: Apr 2nd, 2006, 4:02pm » |
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I suppose I didn't think this through well enough. He would have to have been rendered catatonic for this riddle to work.
My intended solution had to do with the window.
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Grimbal
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Re: Alien Abduction
« Reply #6 on: Apr 3rd, 2006, 3:28am » |
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Aah.
He could look at the weather, maybe the cloud patterns, which could not be predicted precisely because of the butterfly effect and the impossibility to measure the atmosphere with enough precision.
As an added diffitulty, the weather simulation must take into account the heat produced by the computer doing the simulation, which depends on how long the computation takes to complete.
He could just look at the clouds and let his mind wander. That would be enough to make his following decisions unpredictable.
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evergreena3
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Re: Alien Abduction
« Reply #7 on: Apr 6th, 2006, 8:26am » |
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Grimbal,
It would seem that his mind was mapped before he was introduced into the cell, so his state of mind would not have any true impact on the program.
Personally, I say he should pluck a hair and pinch it between his thumb and forefinger. If it sticks to the forefinger, answer "1." If to the thumb, "2."
This is, as others have answered, merely introducing randomness into the equation.
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Sjoerd Job Postmus
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Re: Alien Abduction
« Reply #8 on: Apr 10th, 2006, 1:24pm » |
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It all kinda depends on the way it would work.
The PC already knew that Billy Bob would choose another method for randomness on day #...
Then, the pc would also know which method.
If the PC knew the method would be the weather, the question would be:
How far in front must the PC make the prediction? An hour, two, five? A second maybe? Or even at the same time? Or merely before the paper is opened? (you can know the weather 3 seconds ago, or sometimes even an hour ahead)
If the random number generator would be something generated from inside the cell, the computer would have no way of knowing what it would be!
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Grimbal
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Re: Alien Abduction
« Reply #9 on: Apr 10th, 2006, 2:26pm » |
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Evergreen,
The point was that there is a small window. If Billy watches through the window after his mind was mapped and before making his decision what to write, then what happens outside will affect the decision in an unpredictable way. For instance, Billy could watch the clouds, see a pattern of a rabbit and decide to hop along in his cell. To correctly predict Billy's decisions, the weather outside must be predicted as well and with high accuracy, down to the precise pattern of every cloud. That quicly becomes impossible.
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alien
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Quote:After many days of always guessing the wrong number, Billy Bob realizes the aliens must be somehow predicting his guesses. He thinks about his dilema and after several more days is finally able to return home.
What did Billy Bob do?
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He stopped guessing, so we had no more use for him. Or he said 3 because the computer could not see that one coming.
on Apr 1st, 2006, 8:15am, honkyboy wrote:
Those Aliens are strange fellows.
(no offense to alien) |
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You earthlings are pretty strange to us too: you have five fingers and you are not green.
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| « Last Edit: May 16th, 2006, 10:35am by alien » |
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zelyoni
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Re: Alien Abduction
« Reply #11 on: May 16th, 2006, 8:35pm » |
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instead of saying "I guess 2" why can't he say "You guess 2"
Simply changing the pronoun would give the opposite answer of that which he would guess, while at he same time being technically correct.
Also, by saying "You guess two" the implication is that he guessed one, so he kinda did guess 1, in an indirect way.
Of course, nothing is this simple. 
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| « Last Edit: May 16th, 2006, 8:38pm by zelyoni » |
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alien
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on Apr 1st, 2006, 8:15am, honkyboy wrote:| The piece of paper is used so that Billy Bob does not feel that he is being cheated, though he is allowed no contact with the paper. It is opened and removed via a mechanical arm. |
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When he woke up there was a mechanical arm in his cell. He fought with the mechanical arm, broke it, and said that the mechanical arm killed his wife. Aliens had no choice but to concur that he is a fugitive, handcuffed him and teleported him to FBI office in Langley.
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william11141
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Re: Alien Abduction
« Reply #13 on: Jan 6th, 2007, 8:21pm » |
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What if
the super computer is right outside the window, so he could see what they prodict he will choose, and pick the oppisite?
I don't know, just a guess 
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