a) There are 10 coins. It is known that one of them is fake (by weight, it is heavier than the real ones). How can you determine the counterfeit coin with three weighings on scales without weights?
b) How can you determine the counterfeit coin with three weighings, if there are 27 coins?
Vincent makes small weights. He made 4 weights which should have masses (in grams) of 1, 3, 4 and 7, respectively. However, he made a mistake and one of these weights has the wrong mass. By weighing them twice using balance scales (without the use of weights other than those mentioned) can he find which weight has the wrong mass?
There are some coins on a table. One of these coins is fake (has a different weight than a real coin). By weighing them twice using balance scales, determine whether the fake coin is lighter or heavier than a real coin (you don’t need to find the fake coin) if the number of coins is: a) 100; b) 99; c) 98?
A professional tennis player plays at least one match each day for training purposes. However in order to ensure he does not over-exert himself he plays no more than 12 matches a week. Prove that it is possible to find a group of consecutive days during which the player plays a total of 20 matches.
During the year, the price for a strudel were twice raised by 50%, and before the New Year they were sold at half price. How much does one strudel cost now, if at the beginning of the year it cost 80 pence?
Harry and Matt came down from a mountain. Harry walked on foot, and Matt went skiing, which was seven times faster than Harry. Halfway down, Matt fell, broke his skis and his leg, and hence travelled twice as slow as Harry. Who will descend first from the mountain?
A country is called a Fiver if, in it, each city is connected by airlines with exactly with five other cities (there are no international flights).
a) Draw a scheme of airlines for a country that is made up of 10 cities.
b) How many airlines are there in a country of 50 cities?
c) Can there be a Fiver country, in which there are exactly 46 airlines?
Prove that if the irreducible rational fraction \(p/q\) is a root of the polynomial \(P (x)\) with integer coefficients, then \(P (x) = (qx - p) Q (x)\), where the polynomial \(Q (x)\) also has integer coefficients.
100 fare evaders want to take a train, consisting of 12 coaches, from the first to the 76th station. They know that at the first station two ticket inspectors will board two coaches. After the 4th station, in the time between each station, one of the ticket inspectors will cross to a neighbouring coach. The ticket inspectors take turns to do this. A fare evader can see a ticket inspector only if the ticket inspector is in the next coach or the next but one coach. At each station each fare evader has time to run along the platform the length of no more than three coaches – for example at a station a fare evader in the 7th coach can run to any coach between the 4th and 10th inclusive and board it. What is the largest number of fare evaders that can travel their entire journey without ever ending up in the same coach as one of the ticket inspectors, no matter how the ticket inspectors choose to move? The fare evaders have no information about the ticket inspectors beyond that which is given here, and they agree their strategy before boarding.
Does the number of 1999 occur in the Pascal triangle?