Problems

Show how to place fourteen dominating bishops on a standard \(8\times8\) chessboard. That is, every square either contains a bishop, or is attacked by some bishop.

Place eight independent queens on a standard \(8\times8\) chessboard.

Show how to swap the two pairs of knights on the following strangely-shaped grid. That is, the knights make one move at a time, and you’re trying to get the black nights to where the white knights are, and the white knights to where the black knights are.

Let \(n\) be a positive integer. Prove that it’s impossible to have a closed knight’s tour on a \(4\times n\) grid.

Find an open knight’s tour on a \(2\times2\times2\) cube.

Let \(s\) and \(t\) be two positive integers. Can we have \(s^2=t^2+2\)?

Eleven sages were blindfolded and on everyone’s head a cap of one of \(1000\) colours was put. After that their eyes were untied and everyone could see all the caps except for their own. Then at the same time everyone shows the others one of the two cards – white or black. After that, everyone must simultaneously name the colour of their caps. Will they succeed?

The recertification of the Council of Sages takes place as follows: the king arranges them in a column one by one and puts on a cap of white or black colours for each. All the sages see the colours of all the caps of the sages standing in front, but they do not see the colour of their own and all those standing behind. Once a minute one of the wise men must shout one of the two colours. (each sage shouts out a colour once). After the end of this process the king executes every sage who shouts a colour different from the colour of his cap. On the eve of the recertification all one hundred members of the Council of Sages agreed and figured out how to minimize the number of those executed. How many of them are guaranteed to avoid execution?

At the elections to the High Government every voter who comes, votes for himself (if he is a candidate) and for those candidates who are his friends. The forecast of the media service of the mayor’s office is considered good if it correctly predicts the number of votes at least for one of the candidates, and not considered good otherwise. Prove that for any forecast voters can show up at the elections in such a way that this forecast will not be considered good.