who here is congenitally illogical?

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I couldn't figure this out but when I read the explanation I figured out logically that it is a theory of mind problem not a logic problem.
Maybe it's a theory of mind and logical problem at the same time, but it takes logic to figure that out.
You have to figure out logically that you can only find the answer by using theory of mind.
I failed that logic problem.

I seem pretty good at making logical deductions as long as the picture isn't too complicated. If it is, it can slow me down a lot. I think it's because I'm so poor at flipping back and forth between the big picture and the details, and poor working memory (I think the big picture problem may cause the memory problem). Given enough time I can familiarise myself with quite complex matters, and do well, though it can feel quite rough until I'm starting to master the parameters. The worst situation for me is an urgent, tight deadline for a complex project. I get anxious which makes it harder for me to focus, and when I find what I'm trying to think about confusing, my brain stops functioning properly and my basic logical faculty takes a hit for a while.

I find my intuition quite useful. It's as if my ideas come from a part of my brain that has no language and presumably no logic, I feel them so vaguely at first that I struggle to put them into words, and have to ponder the subject a few times to crystallize out something I can put into words and analyse consciously.

Lack of social information holds me back more than any logic failure. Most projects involve people somewhere along the line.

You draw a chart and fill the blanks(starting with Norwegian in 1st house and Milk drinker in 3rd house becasue they are already set spatially) just the same way as you would fill Sudoku till you get all the info in.

You can put the info you are unsure of in different color or make separate charts for each information, making puzzles of them(that's what I did at first, I started using different text color only when dealing with last a few pieces).

The last blank place is for the fish.


Green house cannot be the 5th because there green is supposed to be "just to the left of the white" and there is no houses right from 5th house so white would have to be left from the green therefore green couldn't be left from the white.

Last edited by Kiriae on 14 Apr 2015, 4:43 pm, edited 2 times in total.

I don't think I'm a very logical person, and yet I was able to guess that answer to the riddle years ago about the injured boy who lost his father in a car accident and the surgeon says, "I can't operate on this boy, he's my son." because it occurred to me that the surgeon might actually be a woman and therefor the boy's mother. And yet when I've told so many other people this riddle they seem to assume that the surgeon absolutely must be a male. Which has led to them giving out some rather creative answers, like one person saying the surgeon must also be a priest.

According to a recent quiz I took I was only one point short of being "right-brained", which made me "balanced". I guess that's good even though I was actually hoping to be right-brained since I'm left-handed, an artist, and can remember entire movies and books almost off by heart but can't remember my times-tables.

Good riddle, i'll figure it out.
(But i haven't done so yet.)

This one is pretty tricky in my language because "surgeon says" is translated to "chirurg powiedział". "Chirurg"(surgeon) is a male form and has no female equivalent(other than "Pani chirurg"-"Ms. surgeon" which is used only when someone is speaking to/about a specific surgeon which is definitelly a woman) so we can't help but use male form "powiedział"(said) instead of female "powiedziała" to be gramatically correct. Which might give the feeling that the "chirurg" must be a male because most of other profession names have male and female forms and go along with male and female "powiedział/powiedziała" forms. Of course we can't use the "Pani chirurg" form because it would blew up the whole point of the riddle.

Polish is not the only language like that - I am pretty sure that at least Japanese and German also have similar quirks. So perhaps that's where the rumor that many people have trouble with this riddle comes from.

But I also got this one correct when I first heard it(in Polish). After wondering for a while if the boy is an adopted child of two homosexuals.

I solved the 'Einstein' problem that Kiriae posted with relative ease, but had to write it out. That make a difference? I didn't even know how to start on the birthday one.

thank you Kiriae for that work I would not have come close to finding that solution in a lifetime of pencil-chewing, because I just wasn't born with the proper kind of brain for such work. btw I can't do Sudoku either but at least now I know something of how you solve those kinds of problems

On the Today's Show back in the Sixties Hugh Downs asked Barbara Walters the riddle "there is a big Indian, and a little Indian (feather, not red dot). The little Indian is the son of the big Indian. But the big Indian is NOT the father of the little Indian. How can this be?"

Barbara Walters, and others on the Today's show were stumped for a half a minute. Long enough for me (as a child) to figure it out, and for Hugh Downs feel compelled to give the answer: "the big Indian is the little Indian's mother."

Amazing how folks assume that members of, not only certain professions, but even of certain ethnic groups. MUST be male! Lol!

There is sort of a standard grid that is used to solve such logic problems in puzzle magazines (such as Dell). I use that for these sorts of problems; one learns from experience which problems it works for. I did another version of this problem, and made the grid in a spreadsheet (blue in a cell where two things intersects means that they go together, for example, the Norwegian is in house number 1; red means that they don't):

The Indian tribe one is a lot like the two doors puzzle in the movie Labyrinth, one speaking door knocker always lies and the other always tells the truth (so one of them says!), and Sarah has to figure out which door leads to the castle. So she asks one of them of the other:

Sarah: Would he tell me that this door leads to the castle?
Guard: [Whispers with his counterparts] Yes?
Sarah: So... the other door leads to the castle and this one leads to certain death.
Guard: [All the guards Oooh] But he could be telling the truth!
Sarah: But then you wouldn't be. So if he told me that this door leads to the castle, the answer you should give me would be 'No'
Guard: But I could be telling the truth!
Sarah: But then he would be lying. So then if he said this door led to the castle, I'd know the answer would still be 'No'
Guard: Is-is that right?
Guard: [snickers] I don't know! I've never understood it!
Sarah: No, no, I figured it out!
[Pushes the other door open revealing the castle's interior]
Sarah: I could never do it before! This is a piece of cake!
[Steps through the door and falls into a trap]
Sarah: AHH!

life is like that - in life's big game of "let's make a deal!"one never knows that the clunker is hiding behind door#1, #2 or #3.

Yes... in life it always three doors, and you can never tell what's behind the door you picked until it's too late:

The lady, the tiger, or...the broom closet!

and depending on the luck of the person, the broom closet might be the best choice in the end.

Even though I consider myself as a smart person I'm not very good on those kind of problems. I guess I'm not that smart.

you are a different kind of smart, there are 7 or 8 different kinds of intelligence. some of us just weren't meant for things like sudoko and riddles.