Psychadelic!

[TheSomeone]

(No this is not copied and pasted)

A judge tells a prisoner he will be hung at noon the following week, either monday, tuesday or wednesday. He also says that it will be a surprise to him.

The prisoner thinks "If I get hung on wednesday, then it won't be a surprise, since I wasn't hung monday or tuesday. Wednesday would be the only day left. That means I will be hung monday or tuesday. But if I get hung on tuesday, it won't be a surprise either, because I was not hange on monday, and being hanged on wednesday would not be a surprise! From my reasoning, being hanged on monday is the only day that it would be a surprise, but that means it wouldn't be a surprise! So none of the days would be a surprising day to be hanged, this must mean I can't get hung either of these three days!"

The next week, he is hung on tuesday, and he was absolutely surprised. Everything the judge had said was true, but where was the flaw in his reasoning?

There was none! Which is exactly why it led him to beleive he could not be possibly be hanged during these three days! But he was! And that really surprised him.

 

[RakuraiTenjin]

Next time he shouldn't kill and eat his wife.

 

[Hazar]

the words might not be copied, but the idea sure is

anyways, his problem is assuming it can't be on wednesday, but I'm too lazy atm to give a full explination.

 

[Pesmerga]

Maybe if they hung/hanged him on Sunday, he would've been more suprised

 

[TheSomeone]

the words might not be copied, but the idea sure is

Well... it IS the basis for at least a gazillion paradoxes:

A man gives his wife a box, and tells her there will be a ring inside, but it will be an unexpected surprise. So the wife thinks that her husband must be lying about a ring inside, because otherwise, she would have expected it when she opened it up. But when she opened up the box, there, to her surprise, was a ring.

 

[Vegeta897]

I saw this in the paper, except it was based on a test that was going to be next week, and it could be on any of the five days, etc.

I remember reading the problem with the logic, but I forgot what it was

Edit: With some skillful googling I have found the answer. It's a bit confusing but I guess it makes some sence. I'll post it in a spoiler.

Spoiler

This inductive reasoning leads you to claim the surprise can't be on any day, and therefore doesn't actually differentiate any of them.

 

[TheSomeone]

Here is another mind implosion trickster:

I am going to present two premises, and derive a valid conclusion from them:
1st premise: I am sitting
2nd premise: I am standing.
Conclusion: Your mom loves me.

There is no way the first two premises could be true, and in the same way, there is no way the first two premises would be true while the conclusion would be false. So whatever the conclusion is, the argument is valid.

(Hint to understanding this one, try forming a sentence from my example, it'll make perfect sense)

The paradox from this one is that you can form a valid argument from contradictory premises.

btw vegeta: Your spoiler is oddly worded. I would make it

Spoiler

This inductive reasoning leads you to claim the surprise can't be on any day, and therefore on whichever day the hanging takes place, it will be surprising.

But it's this whole thing about perecption of truth and yadda yadda.

 

[Vegeta897]

You have me totally lost with this new trick...

I'm going to go to bed to rest my brain...

 

[bliink]

(No this is not copied and pasted)

A judge tells a prisoner he will be hung at noon the following week, either monday, tuesday or wednesday. He also says that it will be a surprise to him.

The prisoner thinks "If I get hung on wednesday, then it won't be a surprise, since I wasn't hung monday or tuesday. Wednesday would be the only day left. That means I will be hung monday or tuesday. But if I get hung on tuesday, it won't be a surprise either, because I was not hange on monday, and being hanged on wednesday would not be a surprise! From my reasoning, being hanged on monday is the only day that it would be a surprise, but that means it wouldn't be a surprise! So none of the days would be a surprising day to be hanged, this must mean I can't get hung either of these three days!"

The next week, he is hung on tuesday, and he was absolutely surprised. Everything the judge had said was true, but where was the flaw in his reasoning?

There was none! Which is exactly why it led him to beleive he could not be possibly be hanged during these three days! But he was! And that really surprised him.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unexpected_hanging_paradox Its a well known paradox.

 

[TheSomeone]

You'll feel stupid once you understand it .

Goodnight. Tommorow, you can wake up to this one:


From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

The Sleeping Beauty paradox is a paradox in probability created by Adam Elga.

The paradox imagines that Beauty volunteers to undergo the following experiment. On Sunday she is given a drug that sends her to sleep. A fair coin is then tossed to determine which experimental procedure is undertaken. If the coin came up heads, Beauty is awakened and interviewed on Monday, and then the experiment ends. If the coin came up tails, she is awakened and interviewed on Monday, given a second dose of the sleeping drug, and awakened and interviewed again on Tuesday. The sleeping drug induces a mild amnesia, so that she cannot remember any previous awakenings during the course of the experiment (if any). During the experiment, she has no access to anything that would give a clue as to the day of the week. However, she knows all the details of the experiment.

Each interview consists of one question, "What is your credence now for the proposition that our coin landed heads?"

How should she answer? On the one hand, the coin is fair, so it seems that the answer must be 1/2. Yet each time she is awakened, she has to consider three possibilities—that the coin landed on heads and it is Monday, that the coin landed on tails and it is Monday, or that the coin landed on tails and it is Tuesday so the answer must be 1/3.

 

[TheSomeone]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unexpected_hanging_paradox Its a well known paradox.

Yeah I did more research on it and found it on wikipedia! Then I saw they had an entire page for paradoxes and now I'm having brain farts all over the place. It's great.

 

[bliink]

Wikipedia has a massive paradox section thats an interesting read: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Paradoxes

EDIT: Yes! and I posted this link as you made that post!

 

[Burn]

A judge tells a prisoner he will be hung at noon the following week, either monday, tuesday or wednesday. He also says that it will be a surprise to him.

The prisoner thinks "If I get hung on wednesday, then it won't be a surprise, since I wasn't hung monday or tuesday. Wednesday would be the only day left. That means I will be hung monday or tuesday. But if I get hung on tuesday, it won't be a surprise either, because I was not hange on monday, and being hanged on wednesday would not be a surprise! From my reasoning, being hanged on monday is the only day that it would be a surprise, but that means it wouldn't be a surprise! So none of the days would be a surprising day to be hanged, this must mean I can't get hung either of these three days!"

The next week, he is hung on tuesday, and he was absolutely surprised. Everything the judge had said was true, but where was the flaw in his reasoning?

There was none! Which is exactly why it led him to beleive he could not be possibly be hanged during these three days! But he was! And that really surprised him.

To quote Penny Aracade "Wow... I need to sit down, this shit is deep"

 

[TheSomeone]

"An object that is not nameable in under eleven words" has just been named in ten.

 

[Razor]

The whole problem with the matter is that killers generally don't think logically, so the analigy is a false one for the statement. Even if a killer did think logically, the only thing he would think about would be the fact that next week, he is going to die. The mere act of trying to reason with the problem and finding out which day the hanging would be on when you're in a court of law and just been sentenced to death in the very near future, would be illogical.

 

[Raziaar]

Why didn't they give him a lethal injection, or electrocute him?

 

[Razor]

Why didn't they give him a lethal injection, or electrocute him?

I think the most surprising thing the judge could of done in the circumstances is right after telling him that, pull out a gun and shoot him. That or release him free of charge.

 

[Raziaar]

I think the most surprising thing the judge could of done in the circumstances is right after telling him that, pull out a gun and shoot him. That or release him free of charge.

Or have him walk around at all times with a blindfold. And a firing squad to finish him off! He'll never see it coming!

 

[TheSomeone]

Or they could have packed a bunch of people in his cell while he was off to the showers, and when he came back, they'd all yell "SURPRISE!" and shoot him in the face.