May 11th, 2007
The following image speaks for itself:
Pages: 1 2
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on Friday, May 11th, 2007 at 6:54 am and is filed under Math, Riddles.
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June 5th, 2007 at 12:40 pm
Why does the black one become slower after running into the white one?
June 5th, 2007 at 2:28 pm
Hi,
I am not sure whether you are serious or not, but anyways, the ants’ speed remains the same after collision.
Why would you think otherwise?
June 14th, 2007 at 6:12 pm
I wasn’t serious, but that’s how it appears in the illustration
November 8th, 2007 at 12:38 pm
Nice riddle.
The fact that the ants change directions does not interfere with the aggregate behaviour of ants, as the spoiler illustrates (in fact, I have just spotted that the image above is a spoiler – for me it was just a copy of the first one!). Hence the time of the last ant will be the time taken by the ant located on one of the extremes and with an initial direction towards the center. With 1000 ants and a 1m stick, that should be close to one hour…
November 8th, 2007 at 5:47 pm
When I said: “What is the longest time it will take the last ant to fall of the stick?” what I meant is not what the expectancy is, but a tight upper bound, and thus the answer I was looking for is exactly 1 hour.
PS – be sure to also read Ants Revamped.
May 18th, 2010 at 6:40 pm
I’ve bookmarked your blog, informative read