June 06, 2004

• Oh, and via Mefi.
• I saw this over at Mefi and was stumped by it. When I figured it out, I felt stupid, which I guess means I'm smart.
• Someone in this thread will mention polar bears. Although it may seem suspicious, these people are harmless. They mean well. The polar bear version of the game is the same, and it's fun too. But beware of the fish people! They seek to ruin your fun! The fish version of the game is annoying and silly and if you spend even so much as one minute thinking about it, you will regret it. If anyone mentions fish, keep calm, and walk on by.
• I couldn't figure it out when described as "Petals around the Roses", but saw it right away when described as "Polar Bears around the Fishing Hole".
• I tried this about 8 times. I just don't get it. I'm not giving up being the Irish mick that I am!!! But, where the fock is the rose?! Let me go back and try again.
• Use the Force, Luke!
• Hey, people, quit giving clues!! Oh, OK; one more. If you find yourself taking notes, as I did, you're trying too hard.
• O.K.-Finally got it! The name of this game should be changed. Yeah, I did better thinking about the Polar bears. Thank you! I was going nuts! I'm going to show this to my friends and drive them nuts! HA!
• Phew, got it. Now, off to torture my friends!
• Er...i'm still trying to get it (started racking my brains when it appeared on mefi)..does that mean i'm Einstein's long lost twin or just too dumb? Someone please put me out of my misery and email me the darned formula!!!
• "Petals around a rose" actually worked better for me than the polar bears. now, to email everyone I know who has something better they ought to be doing ...
• Monkeyfilter: Beware of the fish people! It should be called Petals Around the Daisies.
• Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh.
• As soon as I heard the other name, I understood it right away. Dammit, I feel so dumb now.
• I came across this game via this entertaining article, and it took me a good part of an hour to figure it out. This was, however, because I was looking at the wrong face of the dice! I looked at the "top" face, as if the dice in the picture were resting on their side, and not the "front" face. I considered and dismissed the right answer early on. Eventually I realized it and smacked my head. I wonder where this would put me in this ranking of creative or too-intelligent people.
• Not sure how long it would have taken me without the little background note to help things along.
• expii, thanks! I read the article until the second example and then I got it. That's after throwing the darn dice for about fifteen times. I guess that makes me not very smart, eh.
• Woo hoo!! I think I got it on about the sixth, which probably makes me the average person I claim to be.
• I DON'T GET IT!!!!!!! intense frustration, feeling like an idiot
• It's a visual (no math involved)
• I'm still puzzling over this. I hate myself...
• No pyrrthon! BAD! I got it in one roll, which I think makes me eligible to be put down for terminal stupidity. Maybe it's the way I look at puzzles.
• this reminds me of a silly finger game i learned in high school - a repetitive hand gesture, the other person is supposed to repeat it - only to be told "no, you didn't do it right" not because they didn't do the gesture, but because they didn't do what came after - folding the hands together in the lap and waiting for the other person to go. not the same concept, but the same sort of mental thingy - if you don't look at it the right way, you'll never get it, and you feel like a moron when you finally do see it, because it makes you mad that you didn't see it sooner.
• Oh, gaaaaawwwwwwd. heavy sigh, kicking myself for having lost waaaaaaayyyy too much time on that.:/
• I got it, but I think it's stupid. I don't see why people are so gratified by it.
• Another similar puzzle I was shown at primary school was one involving the rearranging of sticks on a table to (indicate the number of enemies approaching a fort) Took me about two hours before I twigged that it was nothing to do with the way the sticks were arraged... it was the number of fingers the person rearranging them touched against the table... grrrr....
• Apparently, the smarter you are, the longer it takes you to work it out (which makes me really really stupid) Me, too. Because I got it by the third roll. I don't really see how it could be used as a measure of intelligence, though.
• Arrrgh....please please please please...someone put me out of my misery. Forget being really smart - I feel dumber than poo! I just don't get it!
• Pah! The answer obviously is given by a variation of the Banach-Tarski result - which itself utilises Zorn's dubious lemma. *rolls dice again* Ah. Fuck.
• For this, I have found a truly wonderful proof, but the margin is too small to contain it.
• Polar bears hoped me too. This reminds me of that drinking game Two Up, Two Down, One Up One Down. People would get so frustrated with that!
• And yeah, it's not that rewarding once you figure it out.
• the quidnunc kid: What is black-and-white and equivalent to the axiom of choice?
• Aw shucks, jjray, I dunno! Tell me, what is black-and-white and equivalent to the axiom of choice? /straight man
• Sorry, that was a rhetorical question, not a set of dice.
• You can use it to break people. The ones who get it, get it so fast that those who don't are left convinced of chicanery on your part. Then, you send them off to work and let the problem gnaw on their mind for eight hours. Since really, without dice, it's far more difficult to hit the answer.