278-Lateral Thinking Puzzles

Futility Closet

Greg Ross

History

4.8 • 748 Ratings

🗓️ 30 December 2019

⏱️ 30 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Here are six new lateral thinking puzzles -- play along with us as we try to untangle some perplexing situations using yes-or-no questions.

Intro:

Ixonia, Wisconsin, was named at random.

Ben Franklin harnessed the power of long-term interest to make large gifts to Boston and Philadelphia.

The sources for this week's puzzles are below. In two places we've included links to further information -- these contain spoilers, so don't click until you've listened to the episode:

Puzzle #1 is from listener Gabriel Bizcarra.

Puzzle #2 is adapted from Paul Sloane and Des MacHale's 2014 book Remarkable Lateral Thinking Puzzles.

Puzzle #3 is from Greg.

Puzzle #4 is from listener Peter Quinn.

Puzzle #5 is from Greg. Here are two links.

Puzzle #6 is from Sharon. Two links.

You can listen using the player above, download this episode directly, or subscribe on Google Podcasts, on Apple Podcasts, or via the RSS feed at https://futilitycloset.libsyn.com/rss.

Please consider becoming a patron of Futility Closet -- you can choose the amount you want to pledge, and we've set up some rewards to help thank you for your support. You can also make a one-time donation on the Support Us page of the Futility Closet website.

Many thanks to Doug Ross for the music in this episode.

If you have any questions or comments you can reach us at [email protected]. Thanks for listening!

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the Futility Closet Podcast, forgotten stories from the pages of history.
0:14.6	Visit us online to sample more than 11,000 quirky curiosities from a town named in Random to Ben Franklin's gift to the 20th century.
0:23.1	This is episode 278.
0:24.8	I'm Greg Ross.
0:25.8	And I'm Sharon Ross.
0:27.5	This is a special episode of lateral thinking puzzles.
0:30.8	These are puzzles where one of us describes a strange sounding situation and the other
0:35.1	has to work out what's going on, asking only yes or no questions.
0:38.3	Thanks so much to everyone who's been sending in puzzles for us to try. We can always use more,
0:43.0	so please keep sending them to podcast at futilitycloset.com. And we'll be back next week with another
0:48.6	dose of quirky history and another lateral thinking puzzle.
0:59.5	This is from listener Gabriel Biscarra.
1:02.8	A woman sees a stranger get into her car and drive away.
1:06.0	She immediately informs the police who catch the stranger,
1:09.0	and when the car is returned, the woman does not press charges.
1:09.5	Why?
1:13.0	So the stranger got into the woman's car.
1:13.4	Yes.
1:15.2	And drove away.
1:19.5	And she informed the police, but the police don't press charges.
1:21.8	And the woman does not. Well, nobody does.
1:23.0	Nobody presses charges.
	...

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