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On February 13 2010 01:33 Aim Here wrote:
Call them A, B and C, arbitrarily.
Ask A 'Would B and C sometimes both agree that B played SC?'
If the answer is 'No', then pick B
If the answer is 'Yes' then pick C
That's a really good answer except he said they know nothing about each other so I assumed that took away any chance of playing them off each other.
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On February 13 2010 01:42 Klive5ive wrote:Show nested quote +On February 13 2010 01:33 Aim Here wrote:
Call them A, B and C, arbitrarily.
Ask A 'Would B and C sometimes both agree that B played SC?'
If the answer is 'No', then pick B
If the answer is 'Yes' then pick C
That's a really good answer except he said they know nothing about each other so I assumed that took away any chance of playing them off each other.
that's correct.
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Netherlands922 Posts
You're Mike Morhaime and in your hand is an SC2 beta key. You held a contest to determine who gets it and now you're down to 3 finalists. Two of them are starcraft players and one is a Heroes of Newerth player. Obviously, you want to give it to one of the SC players but you don't know who is who.
Here's what you know:
-These starcraft players are special -- one always tells the truth, the other always lies.
-The HoN player really wants that beta key so he's willing to lie or tell the truth whenever he feels like it.
-The contestants are complete strangers, they don't know anything about each other at all
Seems I was late..
I think this is not possible..
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This is not possible, the fact that the HoN player is able to lie or tell the truth according to his own whim means that you can never be 100% sure no matter what question you ask.
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This is not possible, the fact that the HoN player is able to lie or tell the truth according to his own whim means that you can never be 100% sure no matter what question you ask.
Well that means you can't ever trust the person you ask, so you have to give the key to one of the other two. But if one of the other two people is the HoN dude, then the person you're asking questions gives either straight false, or straight true answers so you do have some leverage to get information out of them in those cases.
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If my previous attempt was not good enough then the solution just must be in the wording of the question or something trivial.
If the assertion is:
1) A-Lies B-Truth C-RandomLie/Truth
2) know NOTHING about each other
3) have NO defining characteristics
4) you have ONE question to ask ONE person (chosen by random) and you receive ONE yes/no answer.
Then mathematically it's impossible. No matter how you word your question person C will always be undetectable.
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On February 13 2010 02:34 Aim Here wrote:Show nested quote +This is not possible, the fact that the HoN player is able to lie or tell the truth according to his own whim means that you can never be 100% sure no matter what question you ask. Well that means you can't ever trust the person you ask
Exactly, so you can never use any information you might gain from asking your 1 yes//no question to come to a correct conclusion.
I'm almost certain the "answer" to this will be shown to be wrong
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Ask, "Will you be willing to lie to get this key?"
Truther: No, will answer truthfully that he will not lie
Lier: No, will be willing to lie and hence will answer the opposite: no
HoN player: Wants the key and so will say yes
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On February 13 2010 02:45 HaNdFisH wrote:
Ask, "Will you be willing to lie to get this key?"
Truther: No, will answer truthfully that he will not lie
Lier: No, will be willing to lie and hence will answer the opposite: no
HoN player: Wants the key and so will say yes
HoN player: Says no because he wants to look worthy.
Just to clarify, does the HoN player choose based on his perception of what the proper answer is, or is he actually answering randomly.
If he's answering randomly and the players can't answer questions about other players, I don't see how you can ever make a question wherein the answer set has a difference between the SC and HoN player.
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HaNdFisH Australia. February 13 2010 02:45. Posts 1
This puzzle is nice. Brought me out of lurking, Handfish makes his first post here.
JeeJee, when do we get to know the solution?
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On February 12 2010 23:19 JeeJee wrote:
-The HoN player really wants that beta key so he's willing to lie or tell the truth whenever he feels like it.
This is only info we have so cannot assume that he tells the truth//lies depending on the question. It's possible that he simply flips an imaginary coin in his mind and where it "lands" he deicdes to lie//tell the truth.
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On February 13 2010 02:34 Aim Here wrote:Show nested quote +This is not possible, the fact that the HoN player is able to lie or tell the truth according to his own whim means that you can never be 100% sure no matter what question you ask. Well that means you can't ever trust the person you ask, so you have to give the key to one of the other two. But if one of the other two people is the HoN dude, then the person you're asking questions gives either straight false, or straight true answers so you do have some leverage to get information out of them in those cases.
If you cannot trust the person you ask (let's say A), then you must rely on the person you ask to reveal which of B or C is the HoN player. According to the rules of the puzzle, none of the contestants know anything about the other contestants, so contestant A cannot reveal which of B or C is the HoN player.
It seems an "absolute" solution is impossible. Can anyone figure something out to do better than 50% chance?
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On February 12 2010 23:19 JeeJee wrote:
-The HoN player really wants that beta key so he's willing to lie or tell the truth whenever he feels like it.
I take that to mean he will lie if necessary to get the key, and will also say that he would do it.
I guess you could make some argument about him thinking he is being tested, and wanting to appear honest, but I think the way the question is worded implies that he will do whatever they ask him to.
If the HoN player did have this 50/50 yes-no mechanism then the question would be insoluble and also not really make sense according to the description.
edit:
Reword question to: "I will give you the beta key to you if you are willing to tell a lie for me, would you do it?"
Liar: would lie, says opposite: no
Truth: wouldn't lie, says so, no
HoN player: wants key, saying yes is in his best interests
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On February 13 2010 02:45 XeliN wrote:
Exactly, so you can never use any information you might gain from asking your 1 yes//no question to come to a correct conclusion.
Not at all.
In the cases where the guy being questioned is the HoN dude, picking EITHER of the other two is fine.
But in the cases where it matters which of the two non-questioned people is picked (i.e. the HoN dude is one of them), the questioner can be trusted either to always lie or always tell the truth, and therefore you can use him to get enough information about the other two contestants to safely pick one.
Got that?
Either 1) You're asking the HoN dude a question -> so pick any of the other two
Or 2) The HoN dude is one of the other two, in which case, the fact that the guy you're questioning is either a truthie or a falsie can be used to work out which of them isn't the HoN dude.
You don't know whether you're in situation 1 or 2 but with 1 it doesn't matter who you pick so you just treat it as if you're in situation 2, and you're golden.
I used it in my attempted answer, above, but my answer was disqualified because of the rule that says these three contestants must be strangers to each other.
I'm almost certain the "answer" to this will be shown to be wrong
I'm agreed with you here, but for the reason that the 'stranger' rule makes it almost impossible to form a useful question. I think it might be possible if you ask one to ask the other questions, but the HoN dude is a spanner in the works there too...
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But you forget that there is only one answer. You have to make your decision based on one answer. So I would agree with Aim Here and say his solution is the best so far and would think that the real one is pretty close
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On February 13 2010 03:05 Aim Here wrote:Show nested quote +On February 13 2010 02:45 XeliN wrote:
Exactly, so you can never use any information you might gain from asking your 1 yes//no question to come to a correct conclusion.
Not at all. In the cases where the guy being questioned is the HoN dude, picking EITHER of the other two is fine. But in the cases where it matters which of the two non-questioned people is picked (i.e. the HoN dude is one of them), the questioner can be trusted either to always lie or always tell the truth, and therefore you can use him to get enough information about the other two contestants to safely pick one. Got that? Either 1) You're asking the HoN dude a question -> so pick any of the other two Or 2) The HoN dude is one of the other two, in which case, the fact that the guy you're questioning is either a truthie or a falsie can be used to work out which of them isn't the HoN dude. I used it in my attempted answer, above, but my answer was disqualified because of the rule that says these three contestants must be strangers to each other. I'm agreed with you here, but for the reason that the 'stranger' rule makes it almost impossible to form a useful question. I think it might be possible if you ask one to ask the other questions, but the HoN dude is a spanner in the works there too...
One aspect of what I am saying is that you can never be certain that the person you are asking is the HoN dude no matter what the response.
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On February 13 2010 03:08 XeliN wrote:
One aspect of what I am saying is that you can never be certain that the person you are asking is the HoN dude no matter what the response.
Actually, I was overfast on the Post button, and between you reading it and me editing it, I inserted
You don't know whether you're in situation 1 or 2 but with 1 it doesn't matter who you pick so you just treat it as if you're in situation 2, and you're golden.
Which I think resolves that issue.
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On February 13 2010 03:08 XeliN wrote:
One aspect of what I am saying is that you can never be certain that the person you are asking is the HoN dude no matter what the response.
That is not a problem if you ALWAYS give the key to one of the two people you are not asking.
However, what if the person you are asking is a starcraft player? Then one of the two people you are not asking is the HoN player, and you have to make the starcraft player reveal which it is. But, according to the rules of the puzzle, the starcraft player does not know anything about the other two, so he doesn't KNOW which one is the HoN player. If he doesn't know, then how can he reveal it?
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I though the trick is to come up with a question that makes the HoN dude tell the truth. Create it in such a way that if he lied, he would be acting agains his own interest, he would lose the beta key.
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Bone_Idle, if there is some answer that makes you give the key to the person you ask, then if the HoN dude is smart enough, he will give that answer.
If there is no such answer, you never give the key to the person you ask, then you have to get some information about the other two people from the person you ask. By the rules of the puzzle, the person you ask does not know anything about the other two contestants, and therefore cannot reveal anything about them.
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EPT
