Another logic problem for the 20th puzzle. This one also involves a king and princess (I know this is like my 3rd one out of four but these are some of the harder puzzles.)
A king wants his daughter to marry the smartest of 3 extremely intelligent young princes, and so the king’s wise men devised an intelligence test.
The princes are gathered into a room and seated, facing one another, and are shown 2 black hats and 3 white hats. They are blindfolded, and 1 hat is placed on each of their heads, with the remaining hats hidden in a different room.
The king tells them that the first prince to deduce the color of his hat without removing it or looking at it will marry his daughter. A wrong guess will mean death. The blindfolds are then removed.
You are one of the princes. You see 2 white hats on the other prince’s heads. After some time you realize that the other prince’s are unable to deduce the color of their hat, or are unwilling to guess. What color is your hat?
Note: You know that your competitors are very intelligent and want nothing more than to marry the princess. You also know that the king is a man of his word, and he has said that the test is a fair test of intelligence and bravery. So this test is 100% fair.
White.
Possibilities:
2 black, 1 white
1 black, 2 white
0 black, 3 white
Well it isn’t 2 black 1 white.
That leaves B,W,W or W,W,W. If it were B,W,W then one of the whites would see that the other white didn’t jump up and say B,B,W (any fool could guess that) And he sees one black and deduces the answer. But because neither can get the answer you know it’s all white!