19 December 2008

Guessing the answer without knowing the question

Ian Ayres asks a question at Freakonomics. Which of the following is the correct answer? 4π, 8π, 16, 16π or 32π square inches?

No, I didn't forget the question. But it's possible to make a reasonable guess by trying to reverse-engineer the question.

(Don't read the comments. They're full of people who didn't get it.)

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

I like his reasoning for choosing 4 pi over 16 pi. I didnt see that at all.

Anonymous said...

That's hilarious, or sad, depending on how you look at it.

Anonymous said...

I had a post about the same sort of thing back in May.

http://numberwarrior.wordpress.com/2008/05/16/exceedingly-lame-final-question/

Anonymous said...

I'm guessing it has to do with the amount of pizza in an 8" pizza.

Anonymous said...

I immediately jumped to his question (and answer), but then thought some more. If I were making the test, I wouldn't want this sort of analysis to work. So, is there another question that gives this array of wrong answers (with the right answer buried there)?

How about finding the area of two circles, each with radius 2?

Anonymous said...

And then there's the zero-knowledge test.

Anonymous said...

My father used a similar technique for solving chemistry questions based on the gender of the (hypothetical) chemists.

Anonymous said...

http://markonzo.edu really great sites, thank you, ashley furniture price [url=http://jguru.com/guru/viewbio.jsp?EID=1536072]ashley furniture price[/url], rbjrixo, allegiant air verdict [url=http://jguru.com/guru/viewbio.jsp?EID=1536075]allegiant air verdict[/url], ericiyh, pressure washers info [url=http://jguru.com/guru/viewbio.jsp?EID=1536078]pressure washers info[/url], ewinap, dishnetwork blog [url=http://jguru.com/guru/viewbio.jsp?EID=1536080]dishnetwork blog[/url], 3915, adt security preview [url=http://jguru.com/guru/viewbio.jsp?EID=1536076]adt security preview[/url], vdbna,

Anonymous said...

http://lumerkoz.edu So where it to find?, http://riderx.info/members/Buy-_2104_eftin.aspx fundingopps http://www.lovespeaks.org/profiles/blogs/buy-enalapril designate http://soundcloud.com/ativans onyour agech http://www.ecometro.com/Community/members/Buy-Cephalexin.aspx hoursmobile musing http://soundcloud.com/acyclovir pparks explorations