Lateral-thinking: trying harder in the same direction may not be as useful as changing directions
These puzzles are really frustrating to figure out.
There was something I wanted to say about those puzzles. It was number 4 from the first link, which provoked some digressing thoughts in me.
A man is lying dead in a field. Next to him there is an unopened package. There is no other creature in the field. How did he die?
Solution: The man had jumped from a plane but his parachute had failed to open. It is the unopened package.
This is sometimes given with the following rather elegant clue - as he approached the centre of the field he knew he was going to die. This is another of the top classics which is right up there with 'The Man in the Bar'. If the solver is thinking along the wrong lines (i.e. in the two dimensions of the ground) then the lateral jump to the third dimension can be tough to make.
I was thinking about, how sometimes, one can put so much sincere effort into accomplishing something, but never get it right because they were doing it/thinking along the wrong lines.
Trying harder in the same direction may not be as useful as changing directions altogether.
Oh also, get http://www.stumbleupon.com!
There was something I wanted to say about those puzzles. It was number 4 from the first link, which provoked some digressing thoughts in me.
A man is lying dead in a field. Next to him there is an unopened package. There is no other creature in the field. How did he die?
Solution: The man had jumped from a plane but his parachute had failed to open. It is the unopened package.
This is sometimes given with the following rather elegant clue - as he approached the centre of the field he knew he was going to die. This is another of the top classics which is right up there with 'The Man in the Bar'. If the solver is thinking along the wrong lines (i.e. in the two dimensions of the ground) then the lateral jump to the third dimension can be tough to make.
I was thinking about, how sometimes, one can put so much sincere effort into accomplishing something, but never get it right because they were doing it/thinking along the wrong lines.
Trying harder in the same direction may not be as useful as changing directions altogether.
Oh also, get http://www.stumbleupon.com!