This Is My Brain On Math

My Dad forwarded an email to me last week. The people who'd emailed it to him were convinced it was magic. Dad knew there was some trick but didn't bother looking for it at the time. Here is the email...









There was a bit more that involved some stuff about having to pass it on but that's the core of the trick.

I got it right away.

I couldn't believe it. I miss the obvious all the time. I'm famous for it. But I picked my card and realized it didn't appear in the bottom. I then realized that must be true of all the top cards if the trick were to work so the question then was, "Do any of the top cards appear in the bottom?" Bingo!

I attribute this to working with Catherine on basic word problems. First step in a word problem is to figure out what the question is then work from there. Once I asked the right question of this trick it fell apart. I am now really beginning to understand the benefits of math beyond just numbers - that it really can train you to see things differently and to apply logic where before you might have simply stopped at bewilderment. Neat stuff.

I called Dad to let him in on it. I don't know if he's let his friends know that it wasn't magic after all.

Thanks to We Saw That for the images I used in the post.