[nintenho]

A girl attends her mother's funeral and meets the guy of her dreams at the funeral. They talk and they hit it off. But at the end of the day when he leaves, she realizes that she never got his last name or his number.

The next day the girl's older sister is murdered. Why?

[Tahir2]

I wont spoil it as I have heard of this before and tested it on a few people. One guy got the answer right (or wrong depending on your point of view).

The version I read initially has the mother being murdered....

[Zaphod]

Personally, I rather tend to think the people posting these things at web-boards are the true sociopaths. Most of these (so called) lateral thinking riddles are so old and, trite and contrived that I can hardly believe they’re still making the rounds.

The Albatross one is my personal favorite for unworthy dribble ever. This one is a close second.

Sorry for the rant, and no, I won't spoil any further 'fun' by giving away the answer.

[nintenho]

You are only a sociopath if you actually did this, I believe.

The answer is that she kills her sister to meet the guy again and get his number.

[Sonic]

What's the one with the albatross?

I have heard this before.

[Zaphod]

I didn't mean to come off rude (but I see that I might have). Sorry. It's just that I believe that 'a test' should have some logic consitency to it, and this one doesn't. There are an infinite number of hypotheses that fit the given data and the 'right' answer make as little or much sense as any of them. It's a verbal Rorschach test, i.e. inherently without meaning.

Originally Posted by Sonic

What's the one with the albatross?

Two men went into a restaurant. They both ordered the same dish from the menu. After they tasted it, one of the men went outside the restaurant and killed himself. Why?

[nintenho]

Originally Posted by Zaphod

I didn't mean to come off rude (but I see that I might have). Sorry. It's just that I believe that 'a test' should have some logic consitency to it, and this one doesn't. There are an infinite number of hypotheses that fit the given data and the 'right' answer make as little or much sense as any of them. It's a verbal Rorschach test, i.e. inherently without meaning.
Two men went into a restaurant. They both ordered the same dish from the menu. After they tasted it, one of the men went outside the restaurant and killed himself. Why?

It's okay, I just like getting the answers and saying "Congratulations, you're a sociopath".

I agree that the test doesn't really make any sense though.

I can't figure out the albotross one.

[thehulk]

Originally Posted by nintenho

It's okay, I just like getting the answers and saying "Congratulations, you're a sociopath".

I agree that the test doesn't really make any sense though.

I can't figure out the albotross one.

Get the answer and a bunch of other similar questions here.

[DudeMiester]

Originally Posted by nintenho

You are only a sociopath if you actually did this, I believe.

The answer is that she kills her sister to meet the guy again and get his number.

That's absurd! There is no way of knowing that the man would care if the older sister died. He was likely an associate of the mother, but not a friend of the family at large, because if he was then the girl would almost certainly have previously known him.

If anything, the man was a hitman who was sent to kill the mother and older sister, but by chance the sister wasn't at the chosen location. Moreover, she had moved away from home, and in order to determine her location, he used his charm to extract the necessary information from the younger sister.

[nintenho]

Originally Posted by thehulk

Get the answer and a bunch of other similar questions here.

awesome.

[Simon F]

Originally Posted by Zaphod

Two men went into a restaurant. They both ordered the same dish from the menu. After they tasted it, one of the men went outside the restaurant and killed himself. Why?

That one is actually quite good and perhaps not too contrived.


I haven't looked at the link (after all, these don't work very well unless you can ask "yes/no" questions).

One of my favourites is: "There is dead man in a desert. He is naked and holding a match. Why?"

[K.I.L.E.R]

I answered that the guy was a hitman and already knew her name and number in order to get to her sister.

[nintenho]

Originally Posted by Simon F

One of my favourites is: "There is dead man in a desert. He is naked and holding a match. Why?"

Why?

[K.I.L.E.R]

He wasn't in a desert, he was standing on sulphur(it looks like desert).

Originally Posted by Simon F

One of my favourites is: "There is dead man in a desert. He is naked and holding a match. Why?"

[nintenho]

Originally Posted by K.I.L.E.R

He wasn't in a desert, he was standing on sulphur(it looks like desert).

Kind of confusing:
He and a number of other passengers were making a balloon trip in a desperate attempt to flee a country. The balloon had to lose weight to stop it from crashing. He drew the short match and had to jump.

[Zaphod]

Originally Posted by Simon F

One of my favourites is: "There is dead man in a desert. He is naked and holding a match. Why?"

First of all, the match is broken. Second, the answer is that he's starting a blog about how he's eventually going to trade the match for a house...

[Fred]

The man in the bar one is awesome, I didn't get it (despite the impression that i've heard it before), unlike many of the others which I had satisfactory variants of the answer.

The albatross one is contrived though.

[Simon F]

Originally Posted by nintenho

Why?

Why "what"? Are you asking

1. Why is it a favourite or
2. why is there a dead, naked match-holder in the desert?

Originally Posted by K.I.L.E.R

He wasn't in a desert, he was standing on sulphur(it looks like desert).

As usual, K.I.L.E.R's thinking is soooo lateral, I swear he's lying comatose on the floor

[london-boy]

Originally Posted by Simon F

As usual, K.I.L.E.R's thinking is soooo lateral, I swear he's lying comatose on the floor

He is in a coma and all the posts here are the result of his brain waves, working overtime in his comatose status. And he has a match in his hand.

[ShootMyMonkey]

The vast majority of these little puzzles are extremely contrived. I mean, things like the "A man is performing his job when his suit tears. Less than 5 minutes later, he's dead." or the "A man eats food which is not poisoned, but causes him to die." Both of those are perfectly fine, and have rather acceptable responses (though the second one has an alternate answer which is a bit ... eeeh.).

But puzzles like the "A man meets a one-armed man on the subway, who then pulls out a gun and shoots him." one is just all too contrived. The worst one I've ever seen had to be that "A man is dead in a room with a small pile of woodchips and sawdust." That's just not a puzzle by any means.

[Bigus Dickus]

Originally Posted by ShootMyMonkey

The vast majority of these little puzzles are extremely contrived. I mean, things like the "A man is performing his job when his suit tears. Less than 5 minutes later, he's dead." or the "A man eats food which is not poisoned, but causes him to die." Both of those are perfectly fine, and have rather acceptable responses (though the second one has an alternate answer which is a bit ... eeeh.).

But puzzles like the "A man meets a one-armed man on the subway, who then pulls out a gun and shoots him." one is just all too contrived. The worst one I've ever seen had to be that "A man is dead in a room with a small pile of woodchips and sawdust." That's just not a puzzle by any means.

None of those are legitimate puzzles of any sort. For each, including the one in the OP, there are dozens of plausible explanations, many equally likely relative to the others. I can think of many things that would tear a suit and kill a man. Lots of things can go wrong eating food which causes death. There simply isn't enough information in the "puzzle" stem to differentiate them. So saying that not giving the "expected" answer is wrong is just absurd.

[ShootMyMonkey]

Well, the first two are a bit more open-ended, and indeed have a handful of "expected" answers. The first and second both has a number of plausible answers, but one of the second's answers is just kind of... shaky.

The latter two, while they lack information, the solutions are so contrived that it just can't be considered valid. Particularly the last one. That's the nature of all of these so-called "lateral thinking" puzzles... the whole point is to try and get someone to piece together the remaining information. When the remaining information is just so absurd that it requires a series of assumptions to even make sense, that's when I have to say it's not acceptable.

[AlStrong]

Originally Posted by nintenho

A girl attends her mother's funeral and meets the guy of her dreams at the funeral. They talk and they hit it off. But at the end of the day when he leaves, she realizes that she never got his last name or his number.

The next day the girl's older sister is murdered. Why?

blah...

why was he there in the first place, and what made her think he'd show up at her older sister's funeral? What's the significance of the sister being older? The answer makes no use of the written details, and is a complete fabrication of someone's narcissistic attitude towards coming up with his/her own answer. (Oh...I'm so smart, I wonder if anyone can come to my conclusion.)




(Of course, all of these "questions" can be answered in the world of CSI. )

[Rolf N]

I don't think the point is cleverly guessing the correct answer with no other information than the puzzle. This whole stuff is a game which involves several people, of which only one starts with The Solution, having a back-and-forth conversation, and closing in. The Solution is not necessarily correct or meaningful. It's just the answer, out of many possible answers, that, when found, makes you win the game because the rules say so.

Playing alone doesn't work.

[nintenho]

[QUOTE=Simon F;868731]Why "what"? Are you asking

1. Why is it a favourite or
2. why is there a dead, naked match-holder in the desert?

QUOTE]
b.

figured it out.