games

Marksman Probability Puzzle

Marksman Probability Puzzle

Bruce Ediger

Found a puzzle on the notorious Futility Closet web site.

Here’s Futility Closet’s puzzle. Mr or Ms Closet decided to call the puzzle “Gun Control”. I don’t know if they chose the title to skirt controversy or something.

Problem Statement

Marksman A hits a certain small target 75 percent of the time. Marksman B hits it 25 percent of the time. The two of them aim at that target and fire simultaneously. One bullet hits it. What’s the probability that it came from A?

Wordle Wrap Up

Wordle Wrap Up

Bruce Ediger

There’s a last time for everything. My last Wordle was number 1234.

I decided I can no longer give anything, not views, not ad views, not clicks, to the pro-Trump New York Times. I am rage quitting Wordle.

Here’s my Wordle wrap up stats.

Wordle 1091, June 14, 2024

Wordle 1091, June 14, 2024

Bruce Ediger

I falsely believed that I had found a wordle state where an elaborate regular expression with alternations gives fewer possible answers than a simple regexp in a pipeline with extra greps.

I was wrong.

Wordle 1056, May 10, 2024

Wordle 1056, May 10, 2024

Bruce Ediger

I completed Wordle 1,056 without any mechanical or computational help. I believe I can deduce the answer from my third guess.

Wordle 1001, March 16, 2024

Wordle 1001, March 16, 2024

Bruce Ediger

I got Wordle 1,001 without mechanized help. I feel like the partial solutions would be worth double-checking with Computer Science.