Einstein's Riddle

[Lesley Hines]

Remembered this one - I did it years ago but remembered it doing the escape the room in relation to how long it took me to solve! Apologies if you've seen it before:

There are no tricks, just pure logic, so good luck and don't give up.

1. In a street there are five houses, painted five different colours.
2. In each house lives a person of different nationality
3. These five homeowners each drink a different kind of beverage, smoke different brand of cigar and keep a different pet.

THE QUESTION: WHO OWNS THE FISH?

HINTS

1. The Brit lives in a red house.
2. The Swede keeps dogs as pets.
3. The Dane drinks tea.
4. The Green house is next to, and on the left of the White house.
5. The owner of the Green house drinks coffee.
6. The person who smokes Pall Mall rears birds.
7. The owner of the Yellow house smokes Dunhill.
8. The man living in the centre house drinks milk.
9. The Norwegian lives in the first house.
10. The man who smokes Blends lives next to the one who keeps cats.
11. The man who keeps horses lives next to the man who smokes Dunhill.
12. The man who smokes Blue Master drinks beer.
13. The German smokes Prince.
14. The Norwegian lives next to the blue house.
15. The man who smokes Blends has a neighbour who drinks water.

That should keep you quiet for at least a few minutes I'll leave it open for a week before I post the answer - please pm me the answer if you solve it in the mean time for a special mention when it's done

[Matt Morrison]

Just PM'd Lesley.
If anyone needs a hand I can send over a spreadsheet that will help (if Lesley doesn't think that's too helpful to be competitive!)

[Lesley Hines]

Make your own rules That's exactly how I solved it (well, I at least created the table in Word and then ticked boxes, but y'know...)

Fantastic work!! You're officially in second place

Since the reponses I've had also include their times it would be a great idea if you (honestly) report how long it took so we can see the fastest too. You're up against some stiff competition I'd recommend doing that privately, too.

[Matt Morrison]

You're officially in second place

Arse, arse, arse, arse, arse. Wish I'd spotted it earlier. Bloody families, eh?

EDIT: you just edited that bit in Lesley so I guess you meant 2nd place in time taken, not time submitted. So, that's cool.

[Hugh Binnie]

I hope the answer isn't what I think it is.

[Lesley Hines]

I hope the answer isn't what I think it is.

Douglas Adams? Rick Stein? Who were you expecting? I do like lateral thinking but I draw the line at telepathy. (To be fair I often draw the line at thinking. )

PM me and we'll see if what you're think is right - preferably with supporting evidence (e.g. other pertinent details) and a time

[Jon Corby]

Since the question doesn't actually state that any of the five neighbours owns fish, I'm gonna chalk this off as 'unsolvable'

Also, is this really anything to do with Einstein? The bit about him inventing it and 'if you can solve it you're in the top 2% cleverst people in the world' or whatever always looked a bit tacked on to me when it was sent as a circular email.

[Phil Reynolds]

PM'd my answer to Lesley. I didn't bother with a spreadsheet, just drew a rough table on a scrap of paper. The wording of the puzzle requires you to make certain assumptions - e.g. "the first house" is the one on the left - but nothing unreasonable.

[Jon Corby]

PM'd my answer to Lesley. I didn't bother with a spreadsheet, just drew a rough table on a scrap of paper. The wording of the puzzle requires you to make certain assumptions - e.g. "the first house" is the one on the left - but nothing unreasonable.

It requires you to assume that somebody owns fish, which you're not explicitly told.

[Phil Reynolds]

The wording of the puzzle requires you to make certain assumptions - e.g. "the first house" is the one on the left - but nothing unreasonable.

It requires you to assume that somebody owns fish, which you're not explicitly told.

And the last hint requires you to assume that "neighbour" in this context specifically means "next door neighbour". Are you turning into me now or what?

[Jon Corby]

The wording of the puzzle requires you to make certain assumptions - e.g. "the first house" is the one on the left - but nothing unreasonable.

It requires you to assume that somebody owns fish, which you're not explicitly told.

And the last hint requires you to assume that "neighbour" in this context specifically means "next door neighbour". Are you turning into me now or what?

The fish thing is quite a big deal if you ask me. I've seen this puzzle before so I know it's legit, but I've also come across puzzles before with similarly 'stupid' answers to the one I suggested. Looking for puzzles on the internet is difficult for this reason, you kinda need some assurance of the 'wholesomeness' of the puzzle, otherwise you end up thinking on something for hours only to be told "the way you escape the room is to look at the chair, take what you SAW, cut the chair in half, put the two halves together to make a wHOLE, then climb through the HOLE" or some bollocks

[Charlie Reams]

the way you escape the room is to look at the chair, take what you SAW, cut the chair in half, put the two halves together to make a wHOLE, then climb through the HOLE

You forgot to shout til you're hoarse then ride away. Or at least, that's how it was told to me in primary school.

[Lesley Hines]

Since the question doesn't actually state that any of the five neighbours owns fish, I'm gonna chalk this off as 'unsolvable'

Also, is this really anything to do with Einstein? The bit about him inventing it and 'if you can solve it you're in the top 2% cleverst people in the world' or whatever always looked a bit tacked on to me when it was sent as a circular email.

I can't be doing with all that 2% bollocks either - that's why I didn't include it at the start. It does state that each homeowner has a different pet though. Equally, there are stoopid puzzles like "name the 6 teams in the football league whose names start and end with the same letter" and actually include "The Shit" as an answer. (NB that does mean the other 5 are valid ) I shan't be posting guff like that - I'm not 8

I did find it on the internet, but I specifically looked for it as our office did it about 10 years ago. I liked this one as it didn't waste its time turning the clues into some sort of cheesy narrative, and has more levels of complexity than many.

[Jon Corby]

It does state that each homeowner has a different pet though.

It doesn't at all follow that the unmentioned pet is fish though. It sounds like I'm just getting into a Reynolds-type debate now, but it is a problem - perhaps not a problem with this particular puzzle, but only because I've seen it before and know it's legit. If I were stumbling across it on the web and not on this forum, I may be suspicious...

[Howard Somerset]

The wording of the puzzle requires you to make certain assumptions - e.g. "the first house" is the one on the left - but nothing unreasonable.

No it doesn't. You need to make no such assumption. The way the houses are ordered can be deduced from the clues, and that forms part of the puzzle.

[Phil Reynolds]

The wording of the puzzle requires you to make certain assumptions - e.g. "the first house" is the one on the left - but nothing unreasonable.

No it doesn't. You need to make no such assumption. The way the houses are ordered can be deduced from the clues, and that forms part of the puzzle.

Well, true, inasmuch as you can try each possible combination and all but the right one will lead you to a contradiction, but in that case the hint about the green house being to the left of the white one doesn't add anything useful.

[Howard Somerset]

Well, true, inasmuch as you can try each possible combination and all but the right one will lead you to a contradiction, but in that case the hint about the green house being to the left of the white one doesn't add anything useful.

"Each possible combination" sounds like a lot more work than was actually necessary. I simply took clue 9 to mean that the Norwegian lived in one of the end houses, which gives no more combinations than some other clues. And I agree about your second comment; I only used the the fact that the two houses were adjacent when dealing with clue 4.

[Lesley Hines]

Well it's Sunday so here's the solution and the winners!

The full solution (cheerfully plagiarised from Dinos who wrote it out so beautifully first - thanks )
House 1: Yellow, Norwegian, Water, Dunhill, Cats
House 2: Blue, Dane, Tea, Blends, Horses
House 3: Red, Brit, Milk, Pall Mall, Birds
House 4: Green, German, Coffee, Prince, Fish
House 5: White, Swede, Beer, Blue Master, Dogs


so the German keeps the fish.

As to the competitors:

Dinos Sfyris was first, and Matt Morrison came speeding in just after him. Derek Hazell came a very close third, with Howard Somerset just missing out on the medals. Massive hi-dely ho-dely to you all

Our fastest entrants were from Alice Moore (10 mins) - lordy!, Daniel Turner (15), Phil Reynolds (15-20) and Dinos Sfyris (20 mins). Apologies for only deciding to time it after it was posted, but it's not like there's money up for grabs, and it's a woman's prerogative to change her mind Top job on doing it so fast - wish I could say the same

Also a great big shout out to Angie Green, David Roe, Jeffrey Burgin, Peter McNamara, Hugh Binnie and David Roe, who was so fast he didn't like to brag about it

Thanks very much and hope you enjoyed it!

[Derek Hazell]

Thanks Lesley. Never thought I'd win a medal on a Countdown site Was frustrating but fun at the same time. Looking forward to your next challenge, and in the meantime I'll polish that nice bronze you sent me

[David Roe]

Also a great big shout out to Angie Green, David Roe, Jeffrey Burgin, Peter McNamara, Hugh Binnie and David Roe, who was so fast he didn't like to brag about it

Thanks very much and hope you enjoyed it!

I didn't check my PM's, or I might have told you. But I assume the second time was much faster than the first!

[Lesley Hines]

Late entry from Ian Volante - didn't make it on time but certainly excellent job for getting the right answer