The dates and olives boxes
✓ With solution
Three boxes, every label wrong. One piece of fruit is enough to work it all out… but from which box?
A storeroom has three closed boxes, labelled "Dates", "Olives" and "Mixed". But the worker made a mistake: all three labels are wrong! You may take out just one piece of fruit from one box, without looking inside.
Which box do you take it from to know what is in all three?
- AThe box labelled Dates
- BThe box labelled Olives
- CThe box labelled Mixed
- DOne piece is not enough
Show the answer
Answer: C) The box labelled Mixed. Take it from the box labelled Mixed. Its label is wrong, so it is not mixed: it holds only dates or only olives, and the one piece tells you which. Say it is a date: that box is the dates. Olives and mixed are left for the other two. The box labelled Olives can't hold olives, because its label is wrong, so it is the mixed box, and the box labelled Dates holds the olives. Drawing from either other box could give you a piece that settles nothing.
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