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A puzzle

Posted: Sat Jul 03, 2004 1:03 pm
by Neo
can anyone help me solve this puzzle, its been bothering me for the past few days and no one seems to be able to help.
When my uncle died he left a will instructing his executors to divide his estate of $1,920,000 in this manner. Every son gets 3 times as much as a daughter, and that every daughter should get 2 times as much as their mother.
What is my aunts share?

Re:A puzzle

Posted: Sat Jul 03, 2004 2:45 pm
by Eero Ränik
She gets nothing... think logically.

Re:A puzzle

Posted: Sat Jul 03, 2004 4:28 pm
by Kon-Tiki
It's not stating which aunt, so the easy way out'd indeed be nothing, presuming it's about a different aunt than that whole little piece is about. If it really is the same woman, it's impossible to find out, as you can't say she gets 1/4th or 2/7th or something like that. You're lacking any way of finding out in how many parts that value has to be divided. That one seems to me to be the essential part of solving it, and as it's not given, my answer goes with the one first given: it's a different aunt, which has absolutely nothing to do with the whole story.

Re:A puzzle

Posted: Sat Jul 03, 2004 10:32 pm
by AGI1122
No she does get something since she is a sister of the mother. Unfortunately, the puzzle is unsolvable without knowing how many sons/daughters/mothers there are.

Re:A puzzle

Posted: Sun Jul 04, 2004 1:08 am
by Candy
If it's the aunt of the uncle, according to Dutch law (and probably most others) she should get all, and only when she dies would it be divided among her children (brothers and sisters evenly), without being able to apply a will to that.

If the aunt doesn't belong to the uncle, she doesn't get anything of course.

If the aunt does belong to the uncle and the money goes to the children the aunt must thus be dead too.

Re:A puzzle

Posted: Sun Jul 04, 2004 4:34 am
by CESS.tk
Let S be the amount of sons and D the amount daughters, then the aunt gets
$ 1,920,000 / (1 + 4*S + 2*D)

Re:A puzzle

Posted: Sun Jul 04, 2004 12:36 pm
by Candy
StrangeQuark wrote: Let S be the amount of sons and D the amount daughters, then the aunt gets
$ 1,920,000 / (1 + 4*S + 2*D)
isn't that 1920000/(1+6S+2D) ?

Re:A puzzle

Posted: Sun Jul 04, 2004 12:42 pm
by CESS.tk
Candy wrote: isn't that 1920000/(1+6S+2D) ?
Yes, of course. Thanks for the correction.
I can't read my own handwriting :-[

Re:A puzzle

Posted: Sun Jul 04, 2004 12:57 pm
by Neo
the book from where i got the question, gives me this answer (it is a fraction) 49200 and 10/13 or rather 639610/13.

Re:A puzzle

Posted: Sun Jul 04, 2004 4:59 pm
by Kon-Tiki
Math's my lollipop. I suck at it, so I'm out, although I really wonder how they got the information of the amount of brothers and sisters.

Re:A puzzle

Posted: Mon Jul 05, 2004 12:16 pm
by Neo
that is exactly what i'm trying to figure out too.

Re:A puzzle

Posted: Mon Jul 05, 2004 12:58 pm
by Candy
calculating back, 49200 10/13 = 1920000/39 (easy guess, the divisor had to be odd (for the 13) and divisible by 13, and 13 itself was too small)

this means that 6S+2D = 39-1

now you can make a formula for daughters and sons, and decide on how active the sex life of the uncle would be.

IE, 19-D = 3S, example: with 4 daughters, he has 5 sons

Re:A puzzle

Posted: Mon Jul 05, 2004 1:28 pm
by CESS.tk
Huh?
49200 + 10/13 isn't equal to 1920000/39 ?

Re:A puzzle

Posted: Mon Jul 05, 2004 4:22 pm
by Kon-Tiki
Got a calculator for that one.
(49200 + 10)/13 = 3785.384615
49200 + (10/13) = 49200.76923
49200*10/13 = 37846.15385
1920000/39 = 49230.76923
None match.

Re:A puzzle

Posted: Mon Jul 05, 2004 8:57 pm
by Curufir
Insufficient information.

We don't even know if the people referred to are any relation to you or the uncle.

That can't be the whole question.