WEBVTT 00:00:08.980 --> 00:00:12.163 Before he turned physics upside down, 00:00:12.163 --> 00:00:15.849 a young Albert Einstein supposedly showed off his genius 00:00:15.849 --> 00:00:21.952 by devising a complex riddle involving this list of clues. 00:00:21.952 --> 00:00:24.105 Can you resist tackling a brain teaser 00:00:24.105 --> 00:00:27.123 written by one of the smartest people in history? 00:00:27.123 --> 00:00:28.596 Let's give it a shot. 00:00:28.596 --> 00:00:32.676 The world's rarest fish has been stolen from the city aquarium. 00:00:32.676 --> 00:00:38.786 The police have followed the scent to a street with five identical looking houses. 00:00:38.786 --> 00:00:41.291 But they can't search all the houses at once, 00:00:41.291 --> 00:00:45.244 and if they pick the wrong one, the thief will know they're on his trail. 00:00:45.244 --> 00:00:50.189 It's up to you, the city's best detective, to solve the case. 00:00:50.189 --> 00:00:53.491 When you arrive on the scene, the police tell you what they know. 00:00:53.491 --> 00:00:55.131 One: 00:00:55.131 --> 00:00:58.215 each house's owner is of a different nationality, 00:00:58.215 --> 00:00:59.716 drinks a different beverage, 00:00:59.716 --> 00:01:02.709 and smokes a different type of cigar. 00:01:02.709 --> 00:01:03.568 Two: 00:01:03.568 --> 00:01:08.060 each house's interior walls are painted a different color. 00:01:08.060 --> 00:01:08.933 Three: 00:01:08.933 --> 00:01:14.607 each house contains a different animal, one of which is the fish. 00:01:14.607 --> 00:01:18.428 After a few hours of expert sleuthing, you gather some clues. 00:01:18.428 --> 00:01:20.546 It may look like a lot of information, 00:01:20.546 --> 00:01:23.597 but there's a clear logical path to the solution. 00:01:23.597 --> 00:01:26.203 Solving the puzzle will be a lot like Sudoku, 00:01:26.203 --> 00:01:32.668 so you may find it helpful to organize your information in a grid, like this. 00:01:32.668 --> 00:01:36.415 Pause the video on the following screen to examine your clues and solve the riddle. 00:01:39.285 --> 00:01:40.115 Answer in: 3 00:01:40.115 --> 00:01:41.146 2 00:01:41.146 --> 00:01:42.307 1 00:01:42.307 --> 00:01:47.024 To start, you fill in the information from clues eight and nine. 00:01:47.024 --> 00:01:51.455 Immediately, you also realize that since the Norwegian is at the end of the street, 00:01:51.455 --> 00:01:53.639 there's only one house next to him, 00:01:53.639 --> 00:01:57.383 which must be the one with the blue walls in clue fourteen. 00:01:57.383 --> 00:02:01.695 Clue five says the green-walled house's owner drinks coffee. 00:02:01.695 --> 00:02:06.215 It can't be the center house since you already know its owner drinks milk, 00:02:06.215 --> 00:02:11.211 but it also can't be the second house, which you know has blue walls. 00:02:11.211 --> 00:02:12.561 And since clue four says 00:02:12.561 --> 00:02:16.823 the green-walled house must be directly to the left of the white-walled one, 00:02:16.823 --> 00:02:20.077 it can't be the first or fifth house either. 00:02:20.077 --> 00:02:22.707 The only place left for the green-walled house 00:02:22.707 --> 00:02:25.694 with the coffee drinker is the fourth spot, 00:02:25.694 --> 00:02:28.841 meaning the white-walled house is the fifth. 00:02:28.841 --> 00:02:31.884 Clue one gives you a nationality and a color. 00:02:31.884 --> 00:02:35.539 Since the only column missing both these values is the center one, 00:02:35.539 --> 00:02:38.923 this must be the Brit's red-walled home. 00:02:38.923 --> 00:02:41.964 Now that the only unassigned wall color is yellow, 00:02:41.964 --> 00:02:44.467 this must be applied to the first house, 00:02:44.467 --> 00:02:47.455 where clue seven says the Dunhill smoker lives. 00:02:47.455 --> 00:02:51.663 And clue eleven tells you that the owner of the horse is next door, 00:02:51.663 --> 00:02:55.002 which can only be the second house. 00:02:55.002 --> 00:02:59.651 The next step is to figure out what the Norwegian in the first house drinks. 00:02:59.651 --> 00:03:03.015 It can't be tea, clue three tells you that's the Dane. 00:03:03.015 --> 00:03:08.674 As per clue twelve, it can't be root beer since that person smokes Bluemaster, 00:03:08.674 --> 00:03:11.370 and since you already assigned milk and coffee, 00:03:11.370 --> 00:03:13.167 it must be water. 00:03:13.167 --> 00:03:14.456 From clue fifteen, 00:03:14.456 --> 00:03:18.076 you know that the Norwegian's neighbor, who can only be in the second house, 00:03:18.076 --> 00:03:20.170 smokes Blends. 00:03:20.170 --> 00:03:23.124 Now that the only spot in the grid without a cigar and a drink 00:03:23.124 --> 00:03:24.600 is in the fifth column, 00:03:24.600 --> 00:03:27.908 that must be the home of the person in clue twelve. 00:03:27.908 --> 00:03:31.403 And since this leaves only the second house without a drink, 00:03:31.403 --> 00:03:35.615 the tea-drinking Dane must live there. 00:03:35.615 --> 00:03:40.686 The fourth house is now the only one missing a nationality and a cigar brand, 00:03:40.686 --> 00:03:45.181 so the Prince-smoking German from clue thirteen must live there. 00:03:45.181 --> 00:03:48.623 Through elimination, you can conclude that the Brit smokes Pall Mall 00:03:48.623 --> 00:03:51.470 and the Swede lives in the fifth house, 00:03:51.470 --> 00:03:53.684 while clue six and clue two tell you 00:03:53.684 --> 00:03:57.807 that these two have a bird and a dog, respectively. 00:03:57.807 --> 00:04:01.974 Clue ten tells you that the cat owner lives next to the Blend-smoking Dane, 00:04:01.974 --> 00:04:05.440 putting him in the first house. 00:04:05.440 --> 00:04:07.658 Now with only one spot left on the grid, 00:04:07.658 --> 00:04:11.750 you know that the German in the green-walled house must be the culprit. 00:04:11.750 --> 00:04:13.695 You and the police burst into the house, 00:04:13.695 --> 00:04:16.783 catching the thief fish-handed. 00:04:16.783 --> 00:04:18.933 While that explanation was straightforward, 00:04:18.933 --> 00:04:23.749 solving puzzles like this often involves false starts and dead ends. 00:04:23.749 --> 00:04:26.479 Part of the trick is to use the process of elimination 00:04:26.479 --> 00:04:30.505 and lots of trial and error to hone in on the right pieces, 00:04:30.505 --> 00:04:32.359 and the more logic puzzles you solve, 00:04:32.359 --> 00:04:34.211 the better your intuition will be 00:04:34.211 --> 00:04:39.035 for when and where there's enough information to make your deductions. 00:04:39.035 --> 00:04:42.238 And did young Einstein really write this puzzle? 00:04:42.238 --> 00:04:43.678 Probably not. 00:04:43.678 --> 00:04:44.988 There's no evidence he did, 00:04:44.988 --> 00:04:47.784 and some of the brands mentioned are too recent. 00:04:47.784 --> 00:04:49.460 But the logic here is not so different 00:04:49.460 --> 00:04:53.181 from what you'd use to solve equations with multiple variables, 00:04:53.181 --> 00:04:55.782 even those describing the nature of the universe.