who here is congenitally illogical?

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I have never been able to employ or even comprehend logic and logical processes to solve riddles, puzzles and mysteries. this was recently reinforced in my awareness, by the following riddle-
Albert and Bernard just became friends with Cheryl, and they want to know when her birthday is. Cheryl gives them a list of 10 possible dates:
May 15, 16, 19;
June 17, 18;
July 14, 16;
August 14, 15, 17.
Cheryl then tells Albert and Bernard separately, the respective month and date of her birthday.
Albert says, "I don't know Cheryl's Birthday, but I know that Bernard also does not know."
Bernard says, "At first I didn't know Cheryl's birthday, but now I know."
Albert says, "then I also know Cheryl's birthday."
So, WHEN is Cheryl's birthday?
HOW IN THE HELL IS THIS SOLVABLE???! !

anyways, how many other people here totally fail at logical things/solving riddles?

You could probably get the answer if you're motivated.

I'm not really motivated to try to obtain the answer; maybe when I'm in a more "logical" mood!

There are times when logic in needed in life; but an over-reliance on logic tends to lead to distortions as to what's "real."

It takes a certain amount of motivation.

I'm more motivated to read biographies than to solve logistical problems.

That's just the way my mind works.

If I had to take the GRE to get into a good Grad School---now that's another story!

here is an answer I found online-

Albert knows the month and Bernard knows the day.
Albert knows the month. With the information he received, he can’t tell what her birthday is. However, he can tell with absolute certainty that Bernard does not know either.
(June) 18 and (May) 19 are the only dates with exclusive days. These get eliminated.
If the month is June, Albert wouldn't be certain that Bernard doesn't know either.
This means that all of June gets eliminated. For the exact same reason, all of May gets eliminated as well.
This leaves the dates in July and August.
Now it's Bernard's turn. He confirms that he at first did not know, however with this new information, he is now certain of her birthday.
If the day he got was the 14th, Bernard would still doubt between July and August. July 14th and August 14th get eliminated.
This leaves the 15th of August, the 16th of July and the 17th of August. Bernard either got the number 15, 16 or 17.
It's Albert's turn again. Knowing that Bernard now knows her birthday, he is now also absolutely certain of the date as well.
If the month Albert got was August, he would still doubt between the 15th and the 17th. The 14th of July was previously eliminated by Bernard. This only leaves the 16th of July.

ok, now for some questions of my own-
WHY EXACTLY are the exclusive days of may 19/june18 automatically eliminated? WHY are july 14/aug 14th eliminated? I have gathered so far, that to solve this, one must have a higher-than-average capacity working memory which equals high IQ.

LOL....all that has no relevance to me at present.

I bet, if you spent half an hour exclusively on this, that you probably would have gotten it.

But why spend a 1/2 hour on this?

When you could be thinking about chicks.

^^^
I thank you for your confidence in my non-denseness

I'm logical when giving advice but I s#ck at logic puzzles, with learning & I don't pick up on very obvious stuff.

This question seems to require more theory of mind type stuff than logic. One has to figure out what each person does and does not know, before and after they get clues from the other person.

I couldn't solve it due to theory of mind issue.
I had trouble finding out what Albert knows and what Bernard knows and what Albert means by saying he knows what Bernard knows. I had no idea it means he figured out any clues to the answer before saying this. I was thinking he though nothing because I had no time to think anything yet because I didn't hear what he hear so I couldn't start my reasoning and identify with his reasoning. LOL

Generally I don't have problems while solving riddles though. For example I easily solved this one:

Auntblabby ,haha I don't get it even with the explanation, all I can think when reading problem like that is "blablabla".
Same as with the questions like two trains going at different speed... I cannot see the full picture; I get stuck on the details and the futility of it all. No I have a headache from trying to understand it

I eliminated May 19th, and June 18th, immediately because if Bernard knew either 18, or 19, he would automatically know the month as well.

I then made a grid on a piece of paper to map it out logically: months on one axis, and dates on the other.

But then.... I was dead in the water. No more headway.

The grid did help to understand the above explanation though.

You have to take it to three levels: what you know, and what each of the guys knows. Quite a workout!


Here is a simpler one:

In the desert there are two Indian tribes. Members of one tribe always tell the truth, members of the other always lie.

Members of both tribes look the same.

You come to a fork in the road. One way leads to the big city, the other to a dead end in the middle of the desert where you will be stranded and die. An Indian stands at the fork in the road. But you dont know which tribe he is from. You get to ask one question, and one question only, to find out which fork in the road to take. What is the one question you ask?

Hint: even after you get the life saving answer from the Indian you still wont know which tribe he is from because both kinds of Indians will give you the same answer!