One evening there was a murder in the home of married couple, their son and daughter. One of these four people murdered one of the others. One of the members of the family witnessed the crime. The other one helped the murderer. These are the things we know for sure: The witness and the one who helped the murderer were not of the same sex. The oldest person and the witness were not of the same sex. The youngest person and the victim were not of the same sex. The one who helped the murderer was older than the victim. The father was the oldest member of the family. The murderer was not the youngest member of the family. Who was the murderer?

A professor asked John to write down any multi-digit number. But, he put a condition, the number should not end with a zero. John put down the number 96452. Then the professor asked John to add up the five digits and subtract the total from the original number. John did and here is what he got: 96452 – 26 = 96426 The professor then asked John to cross out any one of the five digits and tell him the remaining numbers. John crossed out the 2 and told the professor the rest of the digits. John neither told the professor the original number nor what he had done with it. Yet, the professor told John the exact number he had crossed out. How is it possible?

Tom meets a new neighbour, Cheryl, next door to him. During the conversation with Cheryl, Tom asks her: “How many kids do you have”. “Three” replied Cheryl. Tom asked “How old are they?” Cheryl answered:”The product of their ages is 36. The sum of their ages are the same as my house number.” After some time Tom replied “I can’t figure it out. I don’t have enough information”. “My apologies, I forgot to tell you that my youngest child likes strawberry milk” replied Cheryl. Tom figured out their ages after her answer and Cheryl confirmed that he was right. How old are Cheryl’s children?

There are five people. One of them shot and killed one of the other five. Dan ran in the NY City marathon yesterday with one of the innocent men. Mike considered being a farmer before he moved to the city. Jeff is a topnotch computer consultant and wants to install Ben’s new computer next week. The murderer had his leg amputated last month. Ben met Jack for the first time six months ago. Jack has been in seclusion since the crime. Dan used to drink heavily. Ben and Jeff built their last computers together. The murderer is Jack’s brother. They grew up together in Seattle. Police arrived at the scene and immediately finds the murderer. Who was the murderer?

Detective Ixolite was investigating a murder. It was a difficult case, and Ixolite was completely stumped until he noticed a message sent to him by the killer cunningly hidden in a newspaper advertisement selling car licence plates. Detective Ixolite thought about it for a while, and when he had solved the puzzle, immediately arrested the guilty man. This is the newspaper advert (car licence plates for sale) that Inspector Ixolite saw. Car License Plates For Sale: W 05 NWO H 13 HSR O 05 EBM D 08 UNE U 10 HTY N 04 BRE N 16 TTE I 26 LHC T 10 AEE I 26 CNA X 22 VDA How did Ixolite know the advert was a clue for him? Solve the code and determine who Ixolite arrested.

Harry went out to dinner with his friends Larry, Barry, and Gary. Harry sat across from Gary. At Gary’s right, opposite Barry, sat Larry. When the waiter came for their orders, Larry and Barry ordered steak. Gary chose fish, and Harry (who likes to be difficult) ordered like this: “Unless the man at the left of the man opposite the man who ordered fish is not having what the man across from the man at the right of the man at my left is having, then I’ll have what the man across from the man at the right of the man opposite me ordered. Otherwise, bring me the Fettuccine Alfredo.” Assuming “right” and “left” is from the viewpoint of the diners, what did Harry order?

There are 3 black hats and 2 white hats in a box. Three men A, B and C each reach into the box and place one of the hats on his own head. They cannot see what color hat they have chosen. The men are situated in a way that A can see the hats on B & C’s heads, B can only see the hat on C’s head and C cannot see any hats. When A is asked if he knows the color of the hat he is wearing, he says no. When B is asked if he knows the color of the hat he is wearing he says no. When C is asked if he knows the color of the hat he is wearing he says yes and he is correct. What is the color of the hat C is wearing and how did he figure out the color of his hat? You can assume that all three men are perfect logicians.

Diophantus was a Greek mathematician. Little is known about the life of Diophantus except for an algebraic riddle from around the early sixth century. The riddle states: Here lies Diophantus,’ the wonder behold. Through art algebraic, the stone tells how old: ‘God gave him his boyhood one-sixth of his life, One twelfth more as youth while whiskers grew rife; And then yet one-seventh ere marriage begun; In five years there came a bouncing new son. Alas, the dear child of master and sage After attaining half the measure of his father’s life chill fate took him. After consoling his fate by the science of numbers for four years, he ended his life.’ How many years did Diophantus live based on the riddle?

Once upon a time there was a beautiful princess named Anna. Anna’s father, the King, wanted to be sure his daughter married an intelligent man. To test his daughter’s suitors the King hid Anna’s picture in one of three boxes. The suitor had to be able to select the box with Anna’s picture on one try and within twenty seconds. On the gold box was the message, “Anna’s picture is in this box”. The silver box had the message, “Anna’s picture is not in this box.” “Anna’s picture is not in the gold box” was written on the bronze box. The King would tell each suitor, “Only one of the three messages is correct.” Which box contained Anna’s picture?

A man worked for a high-security institution, and one day he went in to work only to find that he could not log in to his computer terminal. His password wouldn’t work. Then he remembered that the passwords are reset every month for security purposes. So he went to his boss and they had this conversation: Man: “Hey boss, my password is out of date.” Boss: “Yes, that’s right. The password is different, but if you listen carefully you should be able to figure out the new one: It has the same amount of letters as your old password, but only four of the letters are the same.” Man: “Thanks boss.” With that, he went and correctly logged into his station. Can you figure out the old and new passwords?

A student has missed an excessive number of days at school and thus the principal called him to his office and requested for an explanation. The student said, “There just isn’t enough time for school. I need 8 hours of sleep a day, which adds up to about 122 days a year. Weekends off is 104 days a year. Summer vacation is about 60 days. If I spend about an hour on each meal, that’s 3 hours a day or 45 days a year. I need at least 2 hours of exercise and relaxation time each day to stay physically and mentally fit, adding another 30 days. Add all of that up and you get about 361 days. That only leaves 4 days for school.” The principal is confused, but can’t figure out why. What is wrong with the student’s argument?

There is a row of soldiers that is 1km in length and they walk with a constant speed in a straight line, in one direction. All the way at the end walks a messenger. He has to bring a message to the captain walking all the way at the beginning of the row. The messenger starts walking past the soldiers and immediately turns around when arriving at the captain and walks back to the end of the row. When the messenger is back at the end, the whole group of soldiers have traveled a distance of 1 km. The soldiers and captain are walking at the same constant speed. The messenger (walking faster then the soldiers) is also walking a a constant speed. You don’t know anything about time or speed. How far did the messenger travel from the end of the row to the beginning and back?

After Andrew had been sick for a week, he asked his best friend Jesse to get his books out of his locker. Instead of telling Jesse the three number combination Andrew said he kept a small piece of paper with the combination under his locker door. After school Jesse went to Andrew’s locker and pulled the paper. On the paper was written: 24 24 22 9 9 9 9 22 24 22 9 9. Thinking this would be easy but a little tedious, Jesse entered in every arrangement of 24, 22, and 9 there was without the lock opening. Realizing there was something behind these numbers that he wasn’t noticing, Jesse sat down for a few minutes to think it out. After ten minutes of intense thinking, Jesse went to the locker, entered the combination into the lock and it opened. What was the combination?

A homicide detective is called at a crime scene. A man is lying dead in front of an abandoned building. It is believed that the man jumped out of a window off the abandoned building and committed suicide. The detective asks his team to collect evidence and he heads towards the building. He goes to the first floor and towards the room that is on the front side. Inside the room, he lights a cigarette, walks towards the window facing the dead body, opens the window and throws out the cigarette. He then goes to the second floor and repeats the same process. He keeps doing the same thing till he is done with all the floors and then takes the lift to the ground floor. Upon reaching there, he informs the team that it is not a suicide but a murder. How did he know that it was a not a suicide?

The paragraph below is very unusual. How quickly can you find out what is so unusual about it? “Gatsby was walking back from a visit down in Branton Hill’s manufacturing district on a Saturday night. A busy day’s traffic had its noisy run; and with not many folks in sight, His Honor got along without having to stop to grasp a hand, or talk; for a mayor out of City Hall is a shining mark for any politician. And so, coming to Broadway, a booming bass drum and sounds of singing, told of a small Salvation Army unit carrying on amidst Broadway’s night shopping crowds. Gatsby, walking towards that group, saw a young girl, back toward him, just finishing a long, soulful oration … “ The above passage is taken from the book “Gatsby” written by Ernest Vincent Wright in the late 1930s.