Riddle Me This

In the spirit of pointlessness, I thought I would create a riddle thread. Make your own or shamelessly steal them from else where, I don't care. If you have stolen one you should acknowledge the riddle isn't your own (you don't need to say from where), and no stealing riddles from Arcanum - Albert Leek and the halflings of the Ancient Game will never forgive you! I know there was a riddle thread 10 years ago, even so I thought it might be fun. I'll go first:

What has a nice rack, makes you feel warm inside and has a... tail?

This is one of my own creation, which is probably why it isn't very good.

 

My electric, heated, inflatable fox-girl sex doll.

 

A 'cello being played by Jacqueline dú Pré during the first section of Schumann's 'cello concerto?

 

My guess is Red Stag Black Cherry Jim Beam Bourbon.

I don't know about riddles so much. How about logic puzzles?
Here's a puzzle from years ago that I enjoyed a great deal:

The king wants only the best and brightest for his daughter so he summons the three wisest men in the kingdom to the castle and has his chief adviser put them to a test. The first to correctly solve the test would win the princess's hand in marriage.
The test as devised by the adviser was that each of the wise men would be fitted with a hat. The hats are designed in such a way that no man could see the color of his own hat and the room decorated in such a fashion that there was not the possibility that a man could view his reflection and thus discern the color of his hat. The adviser has at his disposal three red hats and two white hats and made this fact plain to the three wise men. The men were blindfolded, fitted with hats, and their blindfolds were removed. After several minutes the king asked the first man what the color of his hat was.
Despite his wisdom he was unable to determine the color of his hat.
And so it went with the second man.
After a few careful moments of consideration, the third wise man answered and answered correctly...and he was blind!

How did he figure out the color of his hat?

 

Oh. My. God. Dess. :-o

Well, if the first two wise men incorrectly guessed 'red' then the third, blind wise man could logically deduce that they wore white and therefore only red hats remained... yesno?

 

I left out some specific information, sorry.

The first wise man did not guess correctly or incorrectly. He simply responded, "I cannot tell" when asked the color of his hat.
Likewise the second wise man could not deduce the color of his hat and so did not hazard a guess, only confessing his ignorance on the matter.
However, the third and blind wise man: He knew.

 

...The bull moose that's decided to rape you?

Mine's a more accurate riddle based on another source.

What has millions of eyes, but cannot see?

 

The Government. Zing!

 

Re: Hat Riddle

I don't normally bite on these since I'm pretty bad at riddles, but I'll take a stab at it.

3 red hats, 2 white ones. Wise man #1 cannot say, which means the only win condition for him (that is, he sees a white hat on both of the other 2 wise men) does not exist. Therefore, wise man #1 sees either 2 red hats or 1 white 1 red hat.

Wise man #2, knowing the above, had the added benefit of knowing what hat wise man #1 has on, but still does not know which hat he has on. His only known win condition is that he sees a white hat on #1 and #3, which he does NOT see.

All we have learned is that neither #2 and #3 both have white, and neither #1 and #3 both have white.

Then how does #3 know the answer? Clearly I'm missing something.

 

No and no, but partial credit for how much they made me chuckle. I will say the tail and the rack are optional, but the riddle just wouldn't have the same ring to it if I said it "sometimes has a nice rack" and "sometimes has a tail".

I've thought about TDC's puzzle for about 10-15 minutes now and I can't figure it out. I realise both the first two men must see either two red hats or a red and a white hat because if they saw two white hats they'd know theirs was red. I'm leaning to a white hat because of this, but if they all had red hats the uncertainty would still be there. A very good puzzle, I must say. As a retro edit I now realise Philes covered all the points already but it took me a long time to type up my puzzle so I did not see the post. There is one problem I can see with the puzzle however: a blind man being one of the "best and brightest", come on TDC pull your head out of your arse.

If it's also puzzles you're after, I've got an interesting one my cousin told me:

You're outside a room with the door to the room in front of you. There are three light switches on the wall near you. By flicking those switches on and off you must determine which switch is for the light hanging in the centre of the aforementioned room, otherwise the madman who set the challenge will shoot you in the face.

You may only enter the room once and may not open the door to peer in at any time, a rule made by the same madman. From outside the room there is no way of telling if the light is on or off, as there are no windows in the room, no other entrances and a draught-excluder at the bottom of the door stops any light from escaping from the gap under door (I told you the man was mad, what other kind of man would put a draught-excluder in a windowless chimney-less room). Inside the room there is a chair and some cardboard boxes that don't contain anything. If you don't partake in the challenge the man will shoot you, and possibly a puppy if he feels like it. How do you determine with certainty which switch is for the light?

 

The brain. It has millions of neurons dedicated to processing visual input, but can't actually see for itself.

...I don't know the answer to TDC's riddle either, though I've heard it before. I think originally the blind man was supposed to be a fool added as a control, and his answer would've drawn more shock from the listener.

Jojo - am I meant to flip only two switches period, or two out of three can only be used at any one time? If it's the latter, I'd flip switches and gauge the madman's reaction, as he would obviously know the correct switch and change demeanor depending on whether or not he'd be allowed to kill me. If I could only choose and flip two, I'd be in less luck. Also if he's a psychopath I'd be completely screwed.

 

I just edited out the bit about only flipping two as I decided it wasn't relevant and I thought no one would notice my sly edit. Flip the switches however many times you want in whatever combination you want. The madman's in a creepy clown mask so no reaction can be gauged from him.

 

Hmmm....

I don't know. Find a fun solution for this one, though;

Three gods;

True

False

Random

You have no idea which is which. You have to ask them questions to figure out who they are. They all understand English, but will only respond in their own language, saying "da" or "ja" - and you don't know what either word means. For now, you've assigned each one a letter (A, B, C). How do you proceed?

 

So the gods' names are True, False and Random and you need to decide which is which? And they won't lie to you?

 

Never mind all these stupid riddles, I want to know more about this madman character. What is his motivation?

 

His wife died when another madman challenged her to the same task and she got it wrong. That other madman was a clown. He's suffering a psychotic episode as the result of a deep depression (it's his and his wife's wedding anniversary) and decided that he would inflict the same fate on another hapless person. He's not really a bad person, he's just in a bad place right now.

Is that enough motivation for you?

 

In that case, I use the cardboard box to fashion a mask of his wife's face to wear, so that he will be unable to bring himself to shoot me, and will instead break down in tears, and I can hold him gently and whisper that everything will be all right. Then I break the fucker's neck.

Actually, I already know the answers to all of the riddles so far except Grossenschwamm's, so here goes:

I'd ask them each a question to which True and False would both answer yes, e.g. "Do you always tell the truth?". If I get three of the same answer, I know that word means yes. If I get two of one answer, I know that word means yes and also that the one who answered differently is giving random answers. So I have identified which word means yes, and possibly which one is Random.

Then I'd ask a question to which True would answer yes, and False would answer no, e.g. "Is Jojobobo a bit of a twat?". If I get two yes, and one no, then the one who answered no is False. If I get one yes, and two no, then the one who answered yes is True. So I have identified either True or False.

If I found out who Random was from my first question, then I have identified all three. Otherwise, I need to ask one further question. If I know who True is, then I point at one of the others and ask "Is he Random?" True will answer yes or no, and I'll have identified all three. If I know who False is, then I ask the same question, but invert the...

Oh screw this complicated shit. I ask all three of them "Do Gods really exist?" True and False explode because they can't answer without a contradiction, and Random is left a gibbering fool. Thus, I win.

 

You don't know this information about him. All he shouts at you is "Just do the goddamn challenge!" after relaying the premise to you.

Oh come now, "a bit of a twat", you could have been a bit more articulate than that; at least come up with something that makes a bit of an impact if you're going to convey your dislike for me in such a blunt and crude manner. I never saw it before but I can see now why you were mistaken for HWLFP in the past.

 

Et tu, Jojobobo?

 

Why did the dead baby cross the road?