Friday Math Problem
The handshake problem: I invite 10 couples to a party at my house. I ask everyone present, including my spouse, how many people they shook hands with. It turns out that everyone questioned (I didn’t question myself) shook hands with a different number of people. If we assume that no one shook hands with his or her spouse, how many people did my spouse shake hands with?
Please remember: I did not ask myself any questions.
Please also remember: Although it may seem so at first, this problem is NOT intractable.
4 Comments:
"Although it may seem so at first, this problem is NOT intractable."
that's just what somebody presenting an intractable problem would say!
It's more difficult than last week's problem, but I swear it's not intractable. I would never do that to an anonymous group of readers. Maybe only in the company of friends.
i spent the entire weekend thinkin about this and i still don't have a solution that makes sense.
ok, I got it. emailing now! :)
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