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Wed 3 Dec, 2003 03:58 pm
After barely making it across the bridge, you hear two of the forest people arguing. It seems that just before they crossed the bridge, they each bought 10 pair of socks, and in fact, as far as color and size go, they each bought the same exact 10 pairs. Each person has 1 pair of green, 1 pair of blue, etc. etc... But now they have accidentally dropped all their socks and the socks are all mixed up in a pile on the ground.
Because it is pitch-black, they can't see what colors the socks are, but want to divide them up so that they each have the same colors that they bought, i.e. identical sets of green, blue, etc. Luckily the socks are all still in pairs, so they only have to pick up 20 pairs, not 40 individual socks.
The light used in crossing the bridge fell into a bottomless forest pit, so even though it is pitch-black, how can you help the two forest people get one pair each of every color, just like they had before they dropped them?
(Note: no lights, moon, cigarette lighter, etc...)
Are they in a rush, can they wait for daylight?
no one ever said its night time. maybe the foliage is so think, no light gets through.
no lights =P
Throw them both off of the bridge, and take all 40 socks for yourself.
Tetsuo
Not wanting to spoil it for anyone else -
They'd do it by 'One for you and one for me. And one for you and one for me. . . . Right?
How could they do that? They wouldn't know what color the socks are and they want to end up with the same colors they bought
Tetsuo.
Note that I did not say 'one pair for you and one pair for me"
Each colour has a different texture? Or a different length?
I think Mungo's already answered. (That certainly makes sense to me, at any rate.)
In the big pile of 20 pairs of socks, there are two pairs of each color. So if they go through all of the pairs and separate them, ("One for you, one for me"), at the end they will have what they started out with.
hmm...didn't even pick up on that. Nice job, Mungo.