A prisoner had been condemned to be hanged. The warden knew that the prisoner enjoyed logic puzzles. So, he informed the prisoner of the execution date in this way:
"1. You will be hanged on one of the days of next week (Sunday through Saturday). And, 2. you will not be able to logically deduce which day you are to be hanged."
The prisoner realized that this is a puzzle which lends itself to working backward. He reasoned, "If today were Saturday (the last day), and I had not been executed yet, then I would know that today I would be hanged. In other words, if today were Saturday, then I could logically deduce that I would hang today. But, the warden stated that I would not be able to logically deduce which day that I would be hanged. Therefore, I will not be hanged on Saturday."
He reasoned further, "If today were Friday (the next to the last day), and I had not been executed yet, then I would know that today I would be hanged, since I won't be hanged on Saturday. In other words, if today were Friday, then I could logically deduce that I would hang today. But, the warden stated that I would not be able to logically deduce which day that I would be hanged. Therefore, I will not be hanged on Friday."
He similarly eliminated Thursday, since he had previously eliminated Friday and Saturday, and Thursday would then be no surprise. And, he similarly eliminated Wednesday, Tuesday, Monday, and even Sunday. He had eliminated Monday through Saturday. So, he could deduce that Sunday was the execution day, which eliminated Sunday, because of the Warden's original statements. So the prisoner had deduced that he could not be hanged, and still fulfill the Warden's original statements.
When the warden came to visit, on Sunday, the prisoner told him of his reasoning. He added, "You seem to have made a mistake. One of your two statements must be false. I don't see how you can hang me this week and still make it impossible for me to deduce which day it will be."
The warden replied, "Wrong! String him up, boys." And both of the warden's original statements were true.
This is like the coming of the Lord. We are busy making deductions about when it will happen or cannot happen and when it does we will be surprised. It will be unexpected because it didn't fit our deductions but it will fulfill prophecy.
No comments:
Post a Comment