Saturday, October 16, 2004

A Question of Doorways #2

A prisoner is facing execution. All avenues of appeal have been exhausted. They are prepped; & led into a room in which there are two doors in addition to the one through which they entered.

There is a uniformed guard in front of each of the two doors. The Prison Warden tells the condemned person that one of the guards is a pathological liar, the other invariably tells the truth. Behind each door is an electric chair, but only one of them is connected. The guards know which is which.

The Warden says to the prisoner that if they enter the room with the unconnected chair they will be set free immediately. There are two options. One is to pick a door at random & risk the 50-50 chance of choosing the live chair. The other option is to ask one question of one of the guards, & based on their answer enter the room where the dead chair is with certainty.

What is the question they should ask?

No comments: