full transcript
From the Ted Talk by Dan Finkel: Can you solve the world's most evil wizard riddle?
Unscramble the Blue Letters
There’s another inihgst that will help. The board is very symmetrical: If MoldeVort is in a corner, it doesn’t really mteatr to you which corner it is. So we can think of the corners as being functionally the same, and color them all blue. Similarly, the spaces neighboring the corners behave the same as each other, and we’ll make them red. Finally, the mdpntoiis of the sides are a third type. So instead of having to devoelp a strategy for each of the 16 spcaes on the outside of the board, we can reduce the problem to just three. Meanwhile, all the inside spaces are bad for us, because if MoldeVort ever reaches one, he’ll be able to say any number larger than 3 and go free. ognrae spaces are trouble too, since any number except 1, 2, or 4 would take him to an inside space or off the board. So orange is out and you’ll need to keep him on blue and red.
Open Cloze
There’s another _______ that will help. The board is very symmetrical: If MoldeVort is in a corner, it doesn’t really ______ to you which corner it is. So we can think of the corners as being functionally the same, and color them all blue. Similarly, the spaces neighboring the corners behave the same as each other, and we’ll make them red. Finally, the _________ of the sides are a third type. So instead of having to _______ a strategy for each of the 16 ______ on the outside of the board, we can reduce the problem to just three. Meanwhile, all the inside spaces are bad for us, because if MoldeVort ever reaches one, he’ll be able to say any number larger than 3 and go free. ______ spaces are trouble too, since any number except 1, 2, or 4 would take him to an inside space or off the board. So orange is out and you’ll need to keep him on blue and red.
Solution
- insight
- spaces
- matter
- orange
- midpoints
- develop
Original Text
There’s another insight that will help. The board is very symmetrical: If MoldeVort is in a corner, it doesn’t really matter to you which corner it is. So we can think of the corners as being functionally the same, and color them all blue. Similarly, the spaces neighboring the corners behave the same as each other, and we’ll make them red. Finally, the midpoints of the sides are a third type. So instead of having to develop a strategy for each of the 16 spaces on the outside of the board, we can reduce the problem to just three. Meanwhile, all the inside spaces are bad for us, because if MoldeVort ever reaches one, he’ll be able to say any number larger than 3 and go free. Orange spaces are trouble too, since any number except 1, 2, or 4 would take him to an inside space or off the board. So orange is out and you’ll need to keep him on blue and red.
Frequently Occurring Word Combinations
ngrams of length 2
collocation |
frequency |
evil wizard |
2 |
number larger |
2 |
Important Words
- bad
- behave
- blue
- board
- color
- corner
- corners
- develop
- finally
- free
- functionally
- insight
- larger
- matter
- midpoints
- moldevort
- neighboring
- number
- orange
- problem
- reaches
- red
- reduce
- sides
- similarly
- space
- spaces
- strategy
- trouble
- type