Want another reason to like Lewis Carroll? He was also left-handed! Ah, those lefties…so brilliant…so creative…so handsome…
Ahem.
So onto…
Riddle #4
…which is a little more complex.
It comes from the Shakespearean play The Merchant of Venice. There were three caskets – gold, silver, and lead – inside one of which was a portrait of Portia, a wealthy heiress who is bound by a clause in her father’s will that forces her to marry whichever suitor chooses correctly among three caskets. The suitor was to choose one of the caskets, and if he was lucky enough (or wise enough) to choose the one with the portrait, then he could claim Portia as his bride. On the lid of each casket were inscriptions to help the suitor choose wisely.
Portia explained to her suitors that the casket lids would each contain two statements and that no lid contained more than one false statement. She had the following inscriptions put on the caskets:
GOLD:
(1) The portrait is not in here.
(2) The artist of the portrait is from Venice.
SILVER:
(1) The portrait is not in the gold casket.
(2) The artist of the portrait is really from Florence.
LEAD:
(1) The portrait is not in here.
(2) The portrait is really in the silver casket.
Which casket contains the portrait of Portia?
3 comments:
silver
Love Dad
It has to be the silver.
They can't contain two false statements, so that immediately cancels the lead one. Focusing on the Silver one, if the first statement is true, then it is the silver casket. If the first statement is false, it would still have to be the silver because the true statement on the gold would be false, leading back to silver. I think.
Okay, for this one we can immediately rule out the lead casket, for is the portrait were in there then both statements on the lead casket would be false. So the portrait is in the gold or the silver casket. Now, the first statements on the gold and silver caskets agree, so they are both true or both false. If they are both false, the second statements are both true - but they cannot both be true since they are contradictory. Therefore the statements are both true, so the portrait cannot be in the gold casket. This proves that the portrait is in the silver casket.
Way to go everybody!
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