lets say that the owner of the deposit box also realises SHTF so he will be there in 25 hours and bear in mind that chem/bio agent can start to kill the person anytime between 12 and 24 hrs. So if the time it takes to open the box is half an hour the person that hit that particular box will be dead at most 24 hrs later leaving you half an hour to look up which box he opened andtake it home with you minutes before the owner of the box has arrived. Ofcourse he might die only 12 hrs later leaving you a lot of time to run away. The amount of people you ave is unlimited so you could get 1000 ppl to open a box ea and 1 will die easy. But you want to use the least amount of people possible in the amount of time you have and least amount of people to die too. So 1000 people used 1 death means too many people used but you did not take many lives; we want a situation where relatively small amount of people used and a pretty small amount died
Hrrrm, so on the assumption that a box can be opened more than once, here's one solution using 80 people. Line all 1000 boxes in a row, and label them 1-1000. First get 10 people to open 100 boxes each - 1-100, 101-200 ... 901-1000. Then get another 10 people to open 100 boxes each, but this time move along by 50. So 51-150, 151-250 ... 951-50. Then do the same, this time moving along by 25. Then again, by 13, 7, 4, 2 and 1. If you were smart and took notes of which people opened what boxes, you should be able to narrow it down to a specific box. 8 people will die, but you will have only used 80 people to check for you. The problem is that this would take 100 sets of opening boxes, which takes 50hrs (100 x 30mins), which puts you way over the 25hr mark. Even if the 50 hrs could be streamlined and you could set the 80 people in a line, at specific intervals, and have them all open boxes in parallel - each person is still opening 100 boxes. So depending on time allowed, you could double the number of people to 160, and make it 50 boxes each, which should roughly get you to 25hrs and 16 people killed. But it depends on whether you need to be finished within 25hrs, or 25hrs after the first death? If you need to be finished within 1hr of the first death (assuming it takes the whole 24hrs), then you only have enough time to open two boxes per person at most, or 4 boxes at a minimum. If that's the case, i'd line the 1000 boxes in a row, numbered again. Split it into thirds. Get 333 people to simultaneously open boxes 1-333, and then boxes 334-666. Get another 334 people to simultaneously open boxes 667-1000, and then boxes 334-666 (one misses out). Providing that the people were catalogued correctly, so you knew who opened which boxes, then if only one person dies, it was the first box they opened. If two people die, it was the second box they opened. So you use 667 people, with 1 or 2 dying. If you like Russian Roulette (and who doesn't!), the bank CEO could be the 1000th person, therefore only using 333 staff. I'm sure this is not the most eloquent solution, but I'm a little bit flakey on the requirements
we can assume cataloguing doesnt require any time. I will give small hint; the number of people i got to is in low tens and amount that died is a low single digit number
Can someone explain this because I don't get it. 3 boxes, you pick one, one is opened and shown to hold a silver oz. Now 2 independent boxes remain, one gold, one silver At this point how does changing your pick change the odds ?
see post #17 for explanation. The common assumption is that after one box is revealed the remaining two are independent thus making no difference whether or not the choice is switched. This would be the case if you were choosing between only two boxes initially. However, your original choice was based on three unopened boxes, deeming it significantly dependent on the revealed box.
Yeah. This is a mind twister like you said. The presenter knows which is which though, hence irrespective of your choice they'll always reveal silver. So before you chose you knew the presenter would choose silver - hence has more information really become available in a Bayesian sense? Have you got a link to the long term simulations?
Not to toot my own horn but I don't consider myself to be slow... Having said that... I don't get it. If there is evidence of this it would seem like witchcraft to me :/
I will post tomorrow night when i get home to my pc. My phone is rubbish even for replying to text posts.
To me the problem is the language and thus the assumption. I re-read post#17 again to make sure I was clear and I think this is the stumbling block What this mean is before the 'game' begins the contestant has a 2 in 3 chance of picking silver therefore they ALSO have a 2 in 3 chance of winning by switching. But since you CAN switch these are by definition independent events - you are not forced to pick your box from the initial three and remain with that choice from the outsete so to me the logic is incorrect. After the first box is opened you have a clear choice to remain with your first choice or pick a new box so I fail to see how switching has any impact on the odds AT THAT POINT. Looking forward to seeing the answer
Below are some simulation results: And a couple of useful links: http://gilgamesh42.blogspot.com.au/2012/09/understanding-monty-hall-problem.html http://rpsychologist.com/monty-hall-simulation/ And you can even test this on your own here: http://www.grand-illusions.com/simulator/montysim.htm
Last night, I had a "realisation" about this whole problem and now understand why it's better to switch (i.e. more probable to win). What clinched it was when the puzzle was changed to having a choice of 1,000 boxes. - You have a one in a thousand chance of picking the right one on your first pick. - The presenter opens 998 wrong ones. - The one you originally chose is still a one in a thousand chance but the one remaining is now a 999 in a thousand chance of being the right one. It's the ability to swap that is making the whole puzzle strange. Edit: Ooops. Previously I didn't click on the first link which basically does the same alternate example (but with a hundred doors).
