My answer

gurthbruins wrote:

Unusual puzzle!

No doubt!

And It makes use of an

mathsyperson wrote:

Interestingly, you can take a shortcut with this puzzle by "meta-thinking", making the assumption that there is a single correct answer.

"I was telling my friend about a survey I took about house numbers. I told her how many houses were surveyed, and the sum of the surveyed house numbers. She knew that my number was even, and then she managed to figure out what my number was.

What's my house number?"

After thinking for a long while, i figured it out that why it works!
The point is that "1" can not be split further into natural numbers and that house numbers can't be fractions!
I started with putting an upper limit to the sum (which had to be greater than the lowest possible value) and found that in each case, one of the house numbers can be broken down further and thus nothing can be uniquely determined (the number of even and odd numbers also doesn't remain unique )!
But if more conditions are introduced (such as the product of house numbers being maximum/minimum or less than/greater than certain value) then, possibly, a unique solution can be obtained!?

I loved ur "meta-thinking" thing... Is it similar to "lateral-thinking" or something?

You’ve all got the correct answer, as well as some good ideas, but I hope you didn’t neglect the last bit of problem, namely that the total of all the house numbers was 100. This is significant to the solution. Without it, you’d only be making an unwarranted assumption.

Hi Jane;

Sorry, but I thought your problem was little bit more difficult than the partition of 11 into 1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,2.

I am not that familiar with your country. Aren't some English homes numbered by halves and may start as zero.?


This is from Wikipedia.

British  houses started being numbered with the Postage Act of 1765[3]. In rural areas many houses remain named but un-numbered. The odd numbers will typically, although not always, be on the left-hand side as seen from the centre of the town or village, with the lowest numbers at the end of the street closest to the town centre. Intermediate properties usually have a number suffixed A, B, C, etc., but there are several that have been given a half number, e.g. the old police station at 20½ Camberwell Church Street. At least one property (built next to no.2 after the street had been numbered) has been numbered zero.

If you cannot falsify the above then:

Here are both of my new solutions:

4 , 1/2 , 1/2  , 1/2 , 1/2 , 1 , 1 , 1 , 1 , 1. You live at #4.

6 ,  1/2 , 1/2  , 1/2 , 1/2 , 1/2 , 1/2  , 1/2 , 1/2 , 1. You live at #6

With the condition that a house can numbered 0 there are of course, many more.

bobbym wrote:

Hi Jane;

Sorry, but I thought your problem was little bit more difficult than the partition of a 11 into 1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,2.

I am not that familiar with your country. Aren't some English homes numbered by halves and may start as zero.?...

Here is one of my solutions then 4 , 1/2 , 1/2  , 1/2 , 1/2 , 1 , 1 , 1 , 1 , 1. You live at #4.

The puzzle, in any such scenario, will not be solveable!!?

Its a "Hyper-Meta-Lateral-Meta-Meta-Thinking"!!

Oh... I meant...

The puzzle won't be UNIQUELY Solveable.. which is as good (or equivalently bad) as not being able to solve it (i.e. figuring out the house number)!!

One should certainly not overlook this possibility though...

Its better now...

Last edited by ZHero (2010-05-17 03:42:29)

[An argument broke out and I couldn't work out the pros and cons of it so I just deleted it all]