Puzzles/riddles with unsatisfying solutions

[Kyng]

Puzzles and riddles can be great fun: getting the answer to a difficult one can be very rewarding, and even answering an easy one makes us feel a little bit clever . However, there are some puzzles whose solutions leave us feeling unsatisfied: perhaps the logic behind solution feels contrived, or even outright 'cheaty'. If you've run into a puzzle like this, then here's the place to post it.

To start with, we have the following matchstick puzzle:



It says "II = VI" (or "2 = 6" in Roman numerals) - and you need to move one matchstick to make both sides equal. There are two solutions supplied, which are as follows:

Solutions

Solution 1: Make a square root sign: I = √I

Solution 2: Turn the 'V' into an 'X', and re-interpret the left-hand side as '11': 11 = XI

However, neither of these feels like a proper 'solution':

Complaints

In solution 1, the 'square root sign' is very messy, and doesn't really look like one.

In solution 2, re-interpreting 'II' as '11' just feels like cheating .

What about you?

[Pyrite]

I don't have an unsatisfying solution to post right now. I may try and dig out one from Professor Layton as whilst most of his puzzles are great, there are some bad ones!

But I wanted to agree with you on that puzzle solution being annoying, especially the second solution.

Spoils another puzzle too

It reminds me of that "add one stroke of a pen to IX to make a smaller number", the solution of which is to write 'SIX'. However, that solution is much better because at least the whole script has had a format change from Roman numerals to words. By contrast, this solution has the audacity to split the formatting of the equation, which in my opinion is completely unforgivable!

[Moonshroom]

I thought the solution to the legendary "Seven Bridges of Königsberg" problem would bring us together as a species, because it sure took long enough to crack.

It feels... underwhelming as all hell.

[Kyng]

Here's another one that I've always hated:

"A man walks into a restaurant, orders albatross, takes one bite, and kills himself. Why?"

Answer (and complaints)

The man was on a ship with his wife and another man - and they got shipwrecked on a desert island. The wife died, but the two men survived. When they ran out of food, the second man brought the first man a meal which he claimed was albatross - but was in fact his dead wife.

Years later, when he ordered albatross at a restaurant, he took one bite, and recognised that it didn't taste anything like what he had eaten on the desert island. He concluded, therefore, that he must have eaten his wife. Since he couldn't live with this harsh truth, he killed himself.

I just think this is absolutely ridiculous from start to finish. There's no logical pathway from the premise of this puzzle to the 'solution'. It's not a solution that you can figure out: it's a story that you just have to make up .

[Kyng]

I was pretty unsatisfied with the solution to this "Mate in 1" chess puzzle:

Solution (and complaints)

You're supposed to notice that Black has no previous legal move - and therefore, it can't be White's move. Instead, it's Black to move, and then White mates in 1.

Yeah... in my opinion, that just doesn't count. To me, "mate in 1" implies that the player who's moving is delivering the mate - and that isn't what's happening here.

Oh, well. There are still "Mate in 1" puzzles like this, that are tough, but actually satisfying !

[Kyng]

Another of those "matchstick puzzles":



I saw this on Facebook, and people were only posting one proper solution:

Solution (and complaints)

9 - 8 = 6 - 5

Sorry, but this just doesn't work for me. There isn't enough space between the 6 and the 5 to add a '-' sign. To fit it in, you'd need to slide the '5' to the right - but then, you're no longer moving one matchstick: you're moving six matchsticks.

However, I'm pretty sure the above was the intended 'solution'. If we discount it, the only other ones people were proposing were ones that turned the equals sign into a "not equals" sign - which is completely lame, and doesn't really count IMO, because it can be used to solve any matchstick puzzle.