/lit/ - Literature

>>4782567
>>/n/

>beginning to understand similar situations occur everyday, somewhere in the world, in reality.

a choice between being a witness and a murderer

Why is he frowning? I think that's biased.

That's decent plot 101.

>>4782567
The box, the box!

>not jumping in front of the train to sacrifice yourself and have your bone gristle stop the train in its tracks

It's not even an option in this day and age, anymore. Sad.

>>4782637
Only because no-one tries.

>>4782651
damn, that's deep

>>4782567
>that filename

Okay, fags. This is a LOGIC puzzle now. Each guy can use his own switch to change the track. The guys cannot communicate with each other and cannot see what's happening on the other track. They only know the initial direction of the train and they assume that each player is thinking purely logically.

Is there a strategy for the 5 guys to win against the 1 guy?

>>4782684
rofl

>>4782684
Just when I thought things couldn't get any better...

>>4782684
There is too little information on what can and what not be done. We need time, order, what is must and what is optional to take this a puzzle.

>>4782684
The plot thickens.

>>4782724
as a puzzle*

>>4782684
No, the one will always survive. The five will all simultaneously flip their switches every time. The one knows this and will wait.

>>4782730
That presumes the switches cannot be reset and then pulled again.

I push the lever, 5 men die. World's time comes to end. World begins anew. I approach the level, I pull it, one man dies.

>>4782732
And your statement presumes that the car is moving slowly enough that they will have enough time to pull the levers several times. If the car is moving fast enough to have any real consequences, there will only be enough time to pull their levers once.

>>4782684
Since they can't communicate or see what's happening on the other track, the fact that there is 5 of them is irrelevant. All that matters is whether an odd or even number of the five switch the track, so the strategy of the two tracks are identical.

Therefore, since both sides are perfectly logical, they will all know this, and all simply flip a coin of whether to pull the lever, giving them all a 50:50 chance of survival.

I wonder if there's a way to tweak this problem to make it more interesting? Reminds me of the hat riddle.

>>4782741
You presume they have not been already pulling and resetting their levers.

What is the state of the tracks right now at this point? The drawing is ambiguous.

>>4782651
>gave the elephant a sign

pretty nice.

>>4782732
But we don't know which way the train goes.

Let's make this a thread where we attempt to make a riddle from this image.

Group A is made of one entangled man, he attempts to move, it takes 10 seconds for Z to notice the movement and push the lever to the direction of B. Group B is made of five restrained men, if the two of five attempt to move, Z will conclude B movement to be of a bigger importance. By now Group A noticed the switch of tracks, from this predicament he started to worry and fidget faster, now it takes him 7 seconds for Z to notice him and switch the tracks to A advantage. Group B now takes the third man to accompany their movement, the group is sure of their success and move for 10 seconds, the tracks switch. A is tired, he moves now in a slower pace and takes 9 seconds to be noticed, the next turn he will be able to move faster. Two of Group B is tired by now, they look for other restrained men. Train goes 147km/h, the rail length to the switch 5km, how much and in what way Groups should move, when Z has no hands?

>>4782850
You see the grammar and the logic fade with my interest to finish the riddle.

>>4782850

>>4782891
I went through that and removed all the information that can be disregarded on the grounds that the brain either may not be aware of or explicitly is not aware of.
Things the brain knows:
>What a trolley is and that it cannot be stopped.
>A track exists.
>On that track, there are ten beating hearts.
The brain may not even be self-aware, besides which the Cartesian demon negates any choice it could possibly make.

>>4782581
👍