Posted by Anonymous on Sunday, December 2, 2007 at 9:43am.
census taker walked up to the man of the house and asks how old are your 3
children the man says i don't know , but the product of their ages is 72 and
the sum of their ages is my house number. the census taker walks out to the front of the house walks back and says ok i still don't know what the ages are. I forget to tell you the man said the oldest one likes chocolate pudding. the census taker then writes down the ages of the children and
leaves. how old are the children?
What combinations of three numbers multiply out to equal 72 and what are their sums?
Products -
Sums -
If the house number matched any of the sums, the census taker would immediately know the three ages. Since he came back and said he didn't have enough information, it meant that the house number he saw must have appeared more than once in the list of sums and he therefore could not know which of the sums was right. The man's response answered his question.
Can you you see why now?
Good luck.
How do u find the GCF of a #
No, the oldest one likes cherry pie, not chocolate pudding.
"What combinations of three numbers multiply out to equal 72 and what are their sums? " --- There's a lot of possibilities, and I'm simply asking for a direct answer.
And one more thing, the problem is asking the house number of the man, not his children's ages!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
You're losing focus. Pay attention to the numbers, not the food!
3 x 4 x 6 = 72
3 + 4 + 6 = 13
What other combinations can you come up with?
??
1--What combinations of three numbers multiply out to equal 72 and what are their sums?
2--Products: 72x1x1, 36x2x1, 24x3x1, 18x4x1, 18x2x2, 12x6x1, 12x3x2, 9x8x1, 9x4x2, 8x3x3, 6x6x2, 6x4x3.
3--Sums:....... 74,........ 39,....... 28,....... 23,........ 22,...... 19,....... 17,..... 18,......15,....... 14,..... 14,..... 13.
4--If the house number of the house matched any of the sums, the census taker would immediately know the three ages.
5--Since he came back and said he didn't have enough information, it meant that the house number he saw must have appeared more than once in the list of sums and he therefore could not know which of the sums was right.
6--The housewifes response answered his question. Can you see why now?
There was still some question after seeing the sums of the ages. The problem derives from there being more than one set of numbers with the same sum, 2-6-6 and 3-3-8. In as much as the set 2-6-6 does not have "an oldest child" and 3-3-8 does, the ages must have been 3, 3, and 8.
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