Mathematics Puzzle
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Hello Friends,
Today I am giving you a very interesting puzzle. This is not a very simple puzzle. You have to use your gray cells to answer this. You have to face similar problems in your Logical Reasoning part of CAT. Don’t look at the existing answers (in comments), if there is any. Try it yourself
Puzzle
At a census there is the following dialog:
Field helper: number of children?
Citizen: three!
Field helper: age of Your children in whole numbers?
Citizen: The product of the years is 36.
Field helper: This not a sufficent answer!
Citizen: The sum of the ages equals the
number of the house of our next neighbour.
(Field helper acquires the number.)
Field helper: That is still not a sufficient answer!
Citizen: Our eldest child plays the piano.
Field helper: (after some mental calculations) – Fine, now I know the age of your three children. But it would not have been possible without the last clue.
How old are the three children?
Leave your answers below -
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June 28th, 2010 at 7:49 am
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June 28th, 2010 at 9:24 pm
12, 3 and 1
June 28th, 2010 at 10:55 pm
The ages of the childrens are:2,2,9
elder:9
younger:2,2
2×2x9=36
June 28th, 2010 at 11:27 pm
the ages are ; 6,3,2
June 29th, 2010 at 12:05 am
36 – 4 9 1
2 2 9
4 3 3
12 3 1
6 6 1
6 3 2
2 2 9 and 6 6 1 have the same sums. So the field helper was not able to figure out the ages from the house number.
From the last statement there is a mention of an eldest child.. Hence 9 2 2 satisfies
June 29th, 2010 at 12:47 pm
36 has factors as.. 2,2,3,3… u can make three pairs as..
9,2,2.. or 4,3,3.. or 6,3,2.. okk
now as mentioned there “ELDEST SON”… that means all three sons have
diff ages.. only one possiblity.. that is 6,3,2.. all other have two
sons with same ages.. so the key is eldest.. eldest is used always
with more than two.. like eldest of the class. and so on.. not ‘like
eldest of two’..
June 30th, 2010 at 11:13 pm
possible combinations r
914,419,632 etc
but sum of all combs r same thus ans is
6,3,2
June 30th, 2010 at 11:14 pm
ans: 6,3,2
June 30th, 2010 at 11:15 pm
ans:6,3,2
July 1st, 2010 at 6:33 am
2,2,9
the problem becomes easy when followed by each step of the problem
first know all the unique combinations that lead to 36
second choose those two solutions whose sum is the same(as the field helper says its not sufficient)
the alternates left are 2,2,9 and 6,6,1
Then as the eldest son plays the piano,therefore,the solution must have a unique greatest number i.e. 9.
hence,2,2,9
July 3rd, 2010 at 1:53 am
36 = 2^2 x 3^2. If one considers also the one year olds, then there are the following combinations:
1st 2nd 3rd sum
1 1 36 38
1 2 18 21
1 3 12 16
1 4 9 14
1 6 6 13
2 2 9 13
2 3 6 11
3 3 4 10
Only in case of sum 13 there are 2 combinations so we need another hint. But there is an oldest child only if the family has 2 years old twins and a 9 years old child.
I hope you liked the above puzzle
July 13th, 2010 at 9:26 pm
answer is
2 2 9
where 9 is the age of the eldest child
bcoz there only 8 possible combination will be created
numbers addition
1 1 36 = 38
1 3 12 = 16
1 4 9 = 14
1 6 6 = 13
1 2 18 = 21
2 2 9 = 13
2 3 6 = 11
3 4 3 = 10
there are 2 addition (13) are same.. so eldest will be one which is 9
July 22nd, 2010 at 7:03 am
ok,actually when u take the factors of 36 and arrange them u get d following combinations…:
9 4 1
18 2 1
12 3 1
6 3 2
but then he also mentioned that he’s got one eldest son it means there is someone elder than the other two, which means he might have three kids of three different ages(following the different combinations mentioned above) or he might also have three kids such that one is the eldest as he mentioned and the other two of the same age(twins), so here are a few more combinations for this condition:
9 2 2
4 3 3
36 1 1
This is all i could say, if i am wronge then please do correct me and give me a right answer also…..
July 23rd, 2010 at 4:01 am
help for cat exam prepration
books name with writers
and help for entrance exam
August 10th, 2010 at 1:25 am
2 3 6years
August 13th, 2010 at 3:09 am
the answer is 2,2,9
as we know dat there are 0-9 digit so first take 3 places i.e —, now as they said the age of children is whole no. so leave 0 n nw count from 1-9 that is we get 9 no’s,nw 4 getting 36 we need 2 multiply 9*4 n 4 can b written as 2*2 so the blanks r fillde i.e 229.
August 24th, 2010 at 8:51 am
thanks,good question