Math wizard needed

[Guest]

[Bogleg]

In the UK, one of our TV channels, for a few hours a night, run a pay-per-call quiz. This particular question has got all I know stumped so I am calling on the brain trust that is the YakShack to help me. I have the answer. I just need to know how they got it. The question is:-

15 cats meet 3 cats each. Those cats all meet 25 cats and they all go for a curry.
How many cats?

Answer:- 2641

I know. It's a weird question but that is exactly how it was on TV. No one phoning in got the answer and at one point, the top prize was £50.000 

[blackcat20]

Maybe becuase its late here, but that answer doesnt really make sense. If 15 cats meet 3 cats each, thats 45 cats. If 45 cats meet 25 cats each, thats 1125 cats, plus the original 45 and the original 15 is 1185.... so I must be missing something?

[Bogleg]

No, you're not missing anything. Reading it another way for the first part, the 15 cats could all have met the same 3 cats so that would have only been 18 cats. Answers that were phoned in (and wrong) include:-

135, 70, 15060, 868, 85, 88, 4, 1125, 1129, 43, 1560, 1173, 0, 74.

[ferdinand_the_yak]

You've totally lost me there... I can't see any other possible answer (given the wording of the question) than 1185. Seems like more of a logic than a maths question - I'm usually OK at those but this one has me stumped. Will they ever clarify how they got the answer?

[kbmum]

I'm getting two of the wrong answers, but then, I was a journalism major in college.

15 x 3 = 45 + 15 (the original 15) = 60

60 x 25 = 1500 + 60 = 1560

I added 15 to 45, because 45 represents only the number of cats met by the original 15 cats.  Same logic for the next line of the equation.

Another option is that 15 meet 3, for a total of 60, and they meet 25.  Not each meet 25.  So then you'd get 85, another wrong answer.  I think something is missing from the quiz.

[ferdinand_the_yak]

Oops - I forgot to add the original 15 to 45 before multiplying. I agree with Cindy, there must be some other information that the quiz didn't mention.

[Sharon]

There is one thing Boggy failed to mention - these TV shows keep getting prosecuted for using misleading questions  .  They have these ambiguous questions then, once hundreds, possibly thousands of people have phoned in at £1 a go they give out an answer no one can ever fathom out.  They never explain how they came to that answer but do say they have had it checked and verified by a third party.

The way they make money is that you are charged whether you are asked to make a guess or not.  So the presenter is leaping around the studio begging people to phone in.  Every few minutes they take one call but in actual fact hundreds of people could have rung up and just got a recorded message telling them to try again.  These shows are now at epidemic proportion on late night TV and are the bane of our lives (well mine anyway  ).

So for everyone now going doolally trying to figure this out just remember it is nearly impossible.  And Boggy - get some sleep  !

[kbmum]

Thanks for the info, Sharon.   I guess it's only a matter of time before shows like this make their way over to this side of the pond.

Although, I think I know how they came up with that answer.  Some of the cats must have been carrying litters!

[grecopa]

What does "they all go for a curry" mean?

[Sharon]

What does "they all go for a curry" mean?

  This is just a little bit thrown in to confuse you.  It could be taken as simply the cats are all going out to dinner or you could use the letters to 'make' cats ie use the C from curry, the A from all and the T from they, thus giving you another cat!

We have other rip off shows where they use words associations ie they give you the word Far and you have to guess a word that that can follow it.  So maybe Far Away or Farscape.  Again you have no idea if they are changing the words as they go along!

I sincerely hope you don't get these over in the US Cindy - they are a gambling addicts nightmare.  So much so in fact that they now limit the number of calls you can make from a single phone line in one day.  But I think it is something silly like 750 calls a day!  Hardly a sensible limit.

But all that said if anyone does manage to work this out and put Graham out of his misery I would be eternally grateful (until he catches the next question  ).

[grecopa]

I know the answer.  Depending on how long it took for all the cats to meet, there probably ended up being some pregnant cats along the way, so you would have either kittens or unborn fetuses to add to the count. 

[Trey]

I was intrigued so I googled it...a couple of people came up with this answer which has nothing to do with mathematical brilliance, its more a riddle I think 

Firstly, for each of the 15 cats there is three other cats. So thats 15 x 4 = 60
(it is not 15 x 3, cos if one of the cats meets 3, then thats 4 of them, and there will be 15 lots of these 4 cats)

then all cats (60) meet 25 cats
so thats 60 x 26
(and once again not 60 x 25 cos need to include each cat that is meeting the 25 cats = 26)

therefore there are 60 groups of 26 cats (25 meeting 1 cat=26)

therefore all i can make of it is that each of the 26 go for 'a curry' meaning 1 curry and therefore its 26 for 1 = 26 4 1 = 2641

[blackcat20]

so not really mathematical at all...just a very strange riddle... odd. thanks for explaining. 

[Bogleg]

Thanks Trey. Who would have thunk it? I might try this next time one comes up on TV.

[ferdinand_the_yak]

At least I was right about this being a riddle and not that mathematical at all... it seems easy now - but who on earth could have come up with THAT answer???

[bush360]

Trey 

that is amazing, no seriously I regularly return from a night out watching random drivlle from these stupid UK TV channels all for about 5 minutes. it really annoys me these things really warrant any kind of TV faithful.
I would rather watch a bunch of us showing and debating our great Trading card hobby. 26 for 1 Genius 

[allender]

Firstly, for each of the 15 cats there is three other cats. So thats 15 x 4 = 60
(it is not 15 x 3, cos if one of the cats meets 3, then thats 4 of them, and there will be 15 lots of these 4 cats)

then all cats (60) meet 25 cats
so thats 60 x 26
(and once again not 60 x 25 cos need to include each cat that is meeting the 25 cats = 26)

therefore there are 60 groups of 26 cats (25 meeting 1 cat=26)

therefore all i can make of it is that each of the 26 go for 'a curry' meaning 1 curry and therefore its 26 for 1 = 26 4 1 = 2641

I can get the same thing as a riddle for the fewest number, without having glimmed on the cute 4-1 ending. 

First, there are fifteen and each one of them meets three other cats. But those three could have been from within the fifteen because they're "other" to the one. So the first part doesn't imply there are more than 15 cats total.

Second, each cat of the 15 meets 25 other cats, some of which may or may not have been in the original 15. So all we know for sure is that there are at least 26 cats.

Now, I just have to figure out if their "going out for a curry" is to get brushed or to get some Indian food.  I'd think they would stay inside if the former and out for the latter, unless the cafe delivers.