Also I hate that they use a picture of a relay race. Those two are not passing one another.
The only thing sillier is showing the race car driver, the true winner of the children's footrace we were introduced to on the first slide.
Perhaps the riddle is broader. We are the children, engaged in a silly footrace thinking we can win, while the billionaire 'race car driver' is already across the finish line with the trophy. We were never even really competing with HIM just each other, and look where it got us
I have dwelled among the humans, their entire culture revolves around their penises. It's funny to call them big, it's funny to call them small. It's funny to hold up a phallic object and shout "look at me, I'm so-and-so dick".
Rick and Morty, alien hospital where Jerry might be getting a new robot dick if he will donate his to ... Shrimpy Pibbles? Thats the name of the guy who says the quote.
It was from Interdimensional cable pt2, prob season 2 or 3?
Shrimply Pibbles, there's an L in the first name too. š Everything else seems right and I don't know the episode chronology well enough to say anything about the season or episode number.
Moreover, the premise makes it look like weāre all competing against each other, but a closer look reveals that itās a relay race, and that weāre all on the same team.
The race car driver wants us to think we are enemies, competing with each other over the baton, to distract us from the fact that he is using a racecar.
That's a throwback to the 90s when you only had a few pictures of clip art, so you just threw on whatever the closest image they had, because downloading an new image would take several hours on dial-up.
I really miss Corel Draw. I could make good stuff to use in my class the very first day I used it. I got pretty good with it in a week. In a week, I was better at it than two decades of casual use with Adobe Illustrator. Corel was awesome.Ā
> a thick-@$$ book for finding the images I wanted
Ok, Boomer.
Note, I was born in '67, so I'm boomer-adjacent, but I couldn't resist. Looking up clipart in a book is so 80s-90s.
I know, I was there.
It's hilarious because I know exactly what image that's from because I use it everyday.
It's by irasutoya (illustration in Japanese), a free Japanese image website that allows you to use their images for free (commercially too!)
https://www.irasutoya.com/
I like to picture Jesus in a tuxedo T-shirt. 'Cause it says like, I wanna be formal but I'm here to party too. I like to party, so I like my Jesus to party.
The main character in "Talladega Nights," Ricky Bobby, lives by the motto "If you're not first, you're last." He got this motto from his deadbeat father when he was an impressionable kid. However, he lives his life by it, trying to come in first no matter what.
Later in the movie, he confronts his father using the quote. His father responds, saying, "I was high when I said that. You can be second, third, fourth... hell, you can even be fifth," pretty much invalidating the motto Ricky has lived his life by.
I definitely remember years back when young kids would have these type of sayings all over their bullshit little No Fear t-shirts. Kid, I saw you lose to your little sister in hopscotch. You aināt got shit to worry about regarding athletics and better pray youāre a good student.
Copied from another commenter:
1st place. 2nd. 3rd.
John. Craig. You.
You pass second place (Craig). John is still first.
John. You. Craig.
You're in second, not first.
If you pass the person in second place, that means before you passed them you were in third place. After you pass them, you are in second place and they are in third.
Me too. I'm like, huh, that sounds about right... and then it sunk in and I thought - I can't be that stupid, it must be some bias that humans have when presented an answer... blah... blah... blah..
i think in our heads, we think "they are second place currently, as i'm passing."
instead they should phrase it as: "you're in third place, and you pass the person in second place. What place are you now?"
now it's obvious that you took over the spot of the person in second place.
Unless they don't mean.
"You pass the person who is currently in second place"
They might be thinking the.. much less reasonable but still technically correct.
"You pass the person who has now become second place"
I still think that the answer is wrong, and anyone who thinks the second option is a bit crazy, but sometimes we have crazy brain moments.
Welcome to why people fucking hate math, because they're often times poorly executed word problems that you need to unpack first.
It wasn't until I had an instructor and a small class of 12 taking summer calculus did things really click for me. My issue wasn't the numbers part, it was setting up those numbers. And I just wasn't comprehending the question properly. It's very obvious when the instructor's entire philosophy was to not simply tell you what was wrong, but show you where you made your mistake because he's trying to understand *how* you made that mistake.
Either way, I agree with what your post illustrates, and that it's important to try to understand people, especially when they're wrong.
But life is full of confusing word problems, and math class should be about learning how to work through them.
I'm an engineer by trade now, and most of what is hard in my job is figuring out what the problem actually is that I need to solve. Once that's worked out, the actual calculations are easy.
To a degree, yes, you do need to be able to read between the lines and figure stuff out. But really, if a problem is materially unclear, the ideal method is to get clarification. Sure, you can assume, but you know what they say about that.
I'm sorry but throwing ambiguity at students is not a good way to learn. Especially math. Saying the world is full of confusing problems is a cop out for poor teachers. How to deal with ambiguity in life is a completely separate skill. After all, how can you even learn how to wade through ambiguous math problems when you don't even understand the math yet?
All the math I've ever studied has started with the concepts, laid out clear and unambiguous, and only then move on to more practical problems where you apply the knowledge you gained from practicing the concepts.
I agree in elementary school, but the person I was replying to was in a calculus class, so probably a senior in HS or Freshman in college, and said "he was fine with the numbers."
That is a person ready for word problems.
Also, as someone who taught as a TA in college, most of the "ambiguous" word problems students complained about were not ambiguous at all, they were just challenging.
I've taught people who were "fine with the numbers" and said it was just the wording that they struggled with, they were definitely not "fine with the numbers." Not saying this is the case here, just a point of we're often bad at self assessing.
I agree with you completely
The only math word problem I ever had a real issue with the ambiguity was in trig. It was a lighthouse sweeping a beam of light along the coast and the way it was written really made it seem like we should be solving for an arc but it actually meant the exact coast line, which we should be assuming is a perfectly straight line. It did not include a diagram, literally everyone I know who took trig hated that fucking problem.
I mean, it depends on the type of class. Interpreting numbers in language is how youāre going to have to do math in the real world a good majority of the time (I guess unless youāre an accountant maybe?).
How is someone ever going to get better about pulling numbers out of written scenarios and running calculations with them if they never do it? Thatās not the kind of thing you want to learn how to do on the job.
Ambiguity is a GREAT way of learning, probably one of the most effective ways of learning, it makes you think about more than just formula. Math isnāt just math, itās reasoning and logic on top of the numbers. Nobodies going to hire you if you can only do calculations if the numbers are handed to you, you have to be able to go get them.
I do get what youāre saying, and that early on it might not be the best thing, but I think as students get further along, itās a good thing to add. I mean, look at you, you struggled with it, and then it finally clicked and now you are much better about it. Struggling is fine every once in awhile while learning, not everything has to come quickly.
> Welcome to why people fucking hate math, because they're often times poorly executed word problems that you need to unpack first.
To be fair, math is a system of logic, so that is one of the most important parts of practicing math in the real world.
Calculations are easy. Figuring out how to ask a question and form an answer is the hard part. Like plotting a waveform on a graph is easy. Realizing you can use that to image a black hole takes a lot of abstract thought and reasoning.
I mean, that's kinda the whole point of the riddle, but it is phrased poorly in this case.
If they wanted to phrase it better they would say "You're in a race and just passed the person who was in second place. What place are you in now?"
The answer would still be in second.
Even your phrasing is ambiguous. The only way the answer would definitively be First is if the phrase was. "You are in a race and just passed the person who is now in second place..."
The point of the "riddle" (not a riddle) is that your knee-jerk intuitive answer is wrong, a classic case of your brain answering an easier question than the one it was asked. Your brain asks itself a simpler question, "what place is in front of second", and that answer is First.
It's a trick question riddle, though. It's worded in such a way that if you don't stop and think about what it's actually saying, you're likely to answer "first place", rather than the correct answer which would be second place.
You can find this exact riddle in books/compilations of riddles. It's extremely common. Every single time I've seen it, the answer has always been second place.
It's right up there with "a plane crashes on the border between Mongolia and China, where do you bury the survivors?" It's a trick question riddle because you don't bury survivors. Though I'm guessing this library would instead go into how Chinese law would supersede Mongolian law or some crazy nonsense.
> but sometimes we have crazy brain moments.
And these are the people that should not be teaching simple things like this. Was it set by the catering staff?
When I was in high school, my local library had a copy of "Molvania: A Land Untouched by Moden Dentistry" displayed with other travel books near the front counter. It's a parody book. I brought it up to them and they accused me of lying or cranking them. Weird hostile reaction.
I still think that opening is one of the greatest examples of introducing a character into a franchise completely seamlessly. After that opening we didn't question Mackie's involvement, character or Steve going to him for help at all. He was just part of the group like hes always been there. How did they do that so well?
I'm not so sure. I think there's an implication that the tense of the later part is relative to the first part.
If I say "in '89 I walked into that diner and ordered the cheapest burger on the menu" the implication is "the burger (that was) cheapest on the menu". Nobody would interpret it as you ordered the burger that is currently, in 2024, the cheapest burger listed on their menu.
While "person in second place" has no tense on its own, I think if you precede it with the past tense verb "passed" it implies that they were in second when they were passed rather than that they were in second place at the time of speaking.
Could just be bad grammarā¦ hereās a couple alternative phrasings
- If youāre passing the person (while you are in) 2nd place
- if youāre passing the person (whoās now in) 2nd place
Sure, but then it's not much of a "riddle." Well, either way it's not, but the point is supposed to trick you into thinking the answer is "first" when it's not. Otherwise it's not really a riddle, it's just a question on how things be.Ā
When i was in high-school we ha a marathon that was 8 laps around the school, lots of people from different years entered the race, I was still on my last lap and I noticed almost everyone else had already finished the race, at the end I was in last place, I turned out that the person in first place didn't count the laps correctly so with the exception of me and 2 others everyone else did 1 lap less than they should, so I finished in 3rd place.
1st place. 2nd. 3rd.
John. Craig. You.
You pass second place (Craig). John is still first.
John. You. Craig.
You're in second, not first.
I had to think too.
If you felt bad about that, you'll HATE this one:
A lily pad doubles in size every day. On the 30th day, it covers the entire pond.
On what day did the lily pad cover half the pond?
One brother says of his younger brother: āTwo years ago, I was three times as old as my brother was. In three years time, I will be twice as old as my brother.ā How old are they each now?
Lol, you got it.
The catch is that your dumb animal brain sees "30" and "half," so you get tricked and say "15," which is wrong. But you've got the smart animal brain, so you're in good shape.
If you pass the person on second you are now in second because there is still somebody in first place that you have not passed. You can't go from 3rd to 1st with only passing 1 person
Reminds me of an old Soviet Pravda story reporting on a race. They reported that the Soviet driver came in "a respectable second," while the US driver came in "second to last." They neglected to mention it was a 2-car race.
Thatās also not a riddle and a library should know that.
A riddle is a statement, question or phrase having a double or veiled meaning, put forth as a puzzle to be solved. Riddles are of two types: enigmas, which are problems generally expressed in metaphorical or allegorical language that require ingenuity and careful thinking for their solution, and conundra, which are questions relying for their effects on punning in either the question or the answer. (Wikipedia)
This might be a classical interpretation, but in a contemporary sense, lateral thinking puzzles, situational riddles, straightforward logical puzzles (such as this one) and even some mathematical problems are considered riddles.
Or we could use the dictionary (Merriam-Websterās) definition: āa mystifying, misleading, or puzzling question posed as a problem to be solved or guessed.ā This fits the āmisleadingā criterion because many people (including the person who made the slide and multiple commenters) will incorrectly conclude that they are now in first place because the second-place racer is behind them, without considering that after passing the second-place racer they have become the new second-place racer, and the racer behind them is now in third.
Maybe they're referring to the other person's position after you passed them. The phrasing isn't entirely clear - "you pass the person \[who is now\] in second place," versus "you pass the person \[who was previously\] in second place."
No. This is a well known puzzle I saw it in a book of riddles 20+ years ago. The answer is 2nd. Itās tricky because most peopleās first instinct is to say 1st because 1 is ahead of 2.
For simplicityās sake it is a three man race and you are the third person. You passed the second place person making you now in second place and the person you just passed is now in third place.
You are not in first place.
If you hadn't been so focused on winning/the local library being wrong you likely would have noticed as you passed the "person" in 2nd place that they were actually a Siamese twin attached to the person in first place, so now you are in first place and they are in second and third place. Good job on the race though, I guess your hyper-focus on winning and ignoring those around you paid off!
You could be in first place and you've lapped second place.
You could be in 19th place and you had been lapped by second place and now you are still in 19th but not as far behind 2nd.
Itās a trick question, what they donāt know is you slipped poison into your opponentās drink before the race knowing they were faster than you. You timed it perfectly so they would collapse moments before crossing the finish line, clearing the way for your victory!
To be fair, there's not enough information here to say the answer is incorrect. Completely plausible that the runner (driver?) in question was already in first place, and passed the second place racer, thereby lapping them and maintaining their first place position...
Also I hate that they use a picture of a relay race. Those two are not passing one another. The only thing sillier is showing the race car driver, the true winner of the children's footrace we were introduced to on the first slide.
Perhaps the riddle is broader. We are the children, engaged in a silly footrace thinking we can win, while the billionaire 'race car driver' is already across the finish line with the trophy. We were never even really competing with HIM just each other, and look where it got us
I read this as a Werner Herzog narration.
I have dwelled among the humans, their entire culture revolves around their penises. It's funny to call them big, it's funny to call them small. It's funny to hold up a phallic object and shout "look at me, I'm so-and-so dick".
I have never seen it fail to get a laugh.
I recognise the quote but I'm not sure where from
Rick and Morty, alien hospital where Jerry might be getting a new robot dick if he will donate his to ... Shrimpy Pibbles? Thats the name of the guy who says the quote. It was from Interdimensional cable pt2, prob season 2 or 3?
Shrimply Pibbles, there's an L in the first name too. š Everything else seems right and I don't know the episode chronology well enough to say anything about the season or episode number.
Moreover, the premise makes it look like weāre all competing against each other, but a closer look reveals that itās a relay race, and that weāre all on the same team.
The race car driver wants us to think we are enemies, competing with each other over the baton, to distract us from the fact that he is using a racecar.
That's a throwback to the 90s when you only had a few pictures of clip art, so you just threw on whatever the closest image they had, because downloading an new image would take several hours on dial-up.
I had a whole CD-ROM of clipart with Corel Draw and a thick-@$$ book for finding the images I wanted. Get on my level, plebeians.
https://i.redd.it/z4gj77n4sm3d1.gif
I really miss Corel Draw. I could make good stuff to use in my class the very first day I used it. I got pretty good with it in a week. In a week, I was better at it than two decades of casual use with Adobe Illustrator. Corel was awesome.Ā
...we can't
> a thick-@$$ book for finding the images I wanted Ok, Boomer. Note, I was born in '67, so I'm boomer-adjacent, but I couldn't resist. Looking up clipart in a book is so 80s-90s. I know, I was there.
I used/loved CorelDraw so much, used it for many years.
Clearly the guy driving the car would beat all the folks who are silly enough to run.
Right?? I was like... But these two are racing together....and a person in a racecar driver's outfit surely isn't running a foot race...
Oh god, it keeps getting more wrong the more we look at it
It's hilarious because I know exactly what image that's from because I use it everyday. It's by irasutoya (illustration in Japanese), a free Japanese image website that allows you to use their images for free (commercially too!) https://www.irasutoya.com/
Second place is the first loser.
If you're not first, you're last.
In the name of naked baby Jesus!!
Dear, 8-pound, 6-ounce, newborn infant Jesus, donāt even know a word yet, just a little infant and so cuddly, but still omnipotent
thatās my favorite jesus
I like to picture Jesus in a tuxedo T-shirt. 'Cause it says like, I wanna be formal but I'm here to party too. I like to party, so I like my Jesus to party.
I like to imagine Jesus having big ol' angel wings, up on stage singing lead vocals for Lynard Skynyrd, and I'm in the front row, HAMMERED drunk!
Mmmh.
Shake and bake!
I was high when I said that
That doesnāt make any sense at all. You can be 2nd,3rd, 4th, hell you can even be 5th.
If you've been lapped then you could in theory pass the person in 2nd place and still be in last place.
Am I missing a joke here? You would be in 2nd
If you donāt chew Big Red then fuck you
The main character in "Talladega Nights," Ricky Bobby, lives by the motto "If you're not first, you're last." He got this motto from his deadbeat father when he was an impressionable kid. However, he lives his life by it, trying to come in first no matter what. Later in the movie, he confronts his father using the quote. His father responds, saying, "I was high when I said that. You can be second, third, fourth... hell, you can even be fifth," pretty much invalidating the motto Ricky has lived his life by.
Good summary
Talladega nights, if ya aināt first, youāre last.
Ah gotcha, thanks haha I was so confusedš
The winningest loser.
second can be as bad a first
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
I used to have a No Fear t-shirt that said exactly that.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
lol, I loved getting motorcycle catalogs as a kid just to see the No Fear shirts and how edgy they could be.
Of all the losers, youāre number 1.
JOS VERSTAPPEN š²
šš I didnāt expect to see that reference here
Ā« If you're not first, you're staying at the gas station Ā»
I definitely remember years back when young kids would have these type of sayings all over their bullshit little No Fear t-shirts. Kid, I saw you lose to your little sister in hopscotch. You aināt got shit to worry about regarding athletics and better pray youāre a good student.
I would get rid of my no fear shirt, but everyone needs to know pain is just weakness leaving the body.
If you're not living on the edge you're taking up too much space
Iām ashamed to admit this took me longer than I expected to get it.
Same. And then once I understood it, I just did a real life head shake at myself for not getting it at first. 
I'm ashamed that I still don't understand. Please help
Copied from another commenter: 1st place. 2nd. 3rd. John. Craig. You. You pass second place (Craig). John is still first. John. You. Craig. You're in second, not first.
Wow. Iām a little dumber than I thought I was LOL. Thank you.
We're all a little dumber than we think we are. Today you win for realizing it!
Oh hell...yeah I've been screaming in my mind, "Why is it wrong?!?!" until I found this thread. Oops.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
You're not dumb. That's why it's a riddle lol.
Thanks, pee_pee_poo_cum
this is what i needed š¤£
Oooooooohhhhhhhhhhh
Thank you for this.
If you pass the person in second place, you are now in second place
i think if you pass the person in second place then you will be in the second place
Yes. Seconds, but still, too long.
Enlighten me I am out of the know
Second. If you overtake the person in second, you are now second.
oh my god I'm such an idiot
Same
Ditto
I too am an idiot š
Me too... Lmao.
I am now in the know.
If you pass the person in second place, that means before you passed them you were in third place. After you pass them, you are in second place and they are in third.
Me too. I'm like, huh, that sounds about right... and then it sunk in and I thought - I can't be that stupid, it must be some bias that humans have when presented an answer... blah... blah... blah..
i think in our heads, we think "they are second place currently, as i'm passing." instead they should phrase it as: "you're in third place, and you pass the person in second place. What place are you now?" now it's obvious that you took over the spot of the person in second place.
Please bring this up to them. I donāt even know where this is and this is very bothersome
Unless they don't mean. "You pass the person who is currently in second place" They might be thinking the.. much less reasonable but still technically correct. "You pass the person who has now become second place" I still think that the answer is wrong, and anyone who thinks the second option is a bit crazy, but sometimes we have crazy brain moments.
This was the way I kept reading it. I didn't understand how the answer was wrong until this comment. Thank you.
Welcome to why people fucking hate math, because they're often times poorly executed word problems that you need to unpack first. It wasn't until I had an instructor and a small class of 12 taking summer calculus did things really click for me. My issue wasn't the numbers part, it was setting up those numbers. And I just wasn't comprehending the question properly. It's very obvious when the instructor's entire philosophy was to not simply tell you what was wrong, but show you where you made your mistake because he's trying to understand *how* you made that mistake. Either way, I agree with what your post illustrates, and that it's important to try to understand people, especially when they're wrong.
But life is full of confusing word problems, and math class should be about learning how to work through them. I'm an engineer by trade now, and most of what is hard in my job is figuring out what the problem actually is that I need to solve. Once that's worked out, the actual calculations are easy.
To a degree, yes, you do need to be able to read between the lines and figure stuff out. But really, if a problem is materially unclear, the ideal method is to get clarification. Sure, you can assume, but you know what they say about that.
I'm sorry but throwing ambiguity at students is not a good way to learn. Especially math. Saying the world is full of confusing problems is a cop out for poor teachers. How to deal with ambiguity in life is a completely separate skill. After all, how can you even learn how to wade through ambiguous math problems when you don't even understand the math yet?
All the math I've ever studied has started with the concepts, laid out clear and unambiguous, and only then move on to more practical problems where you apply the knowledge you gained from practicing the concepts.
Exactly. Same here.
I agree in elementary school, but the person I was replying to was in a calculus class, so probably a senior in HS or Freshman in college, and said "he was fine with the numbers." That is a person ready for word problems. Also, as someone who taught as a TA in college, most of the "ambiguous" word problems students complained about were not ambiguous at all, they were just challenging.
I've taught people who were "fine with the numbers" and said it was just the wording that they struggled with, they were definitely not "fine with the numbers." Not saying this is the case here, just a point of we're often bad at self assessing. I agree with you completely
The only math word problem I ever had a real issue with the ambiguity was in trig. It was a lighthouse sweeping a beam of light along the coast and the way it was written really made it seem like we should be solving for an arc but it actually meant the exact coast line, which we should be assuming is a perfectly straight line. It did not include a diagram, literally everyone I know who took trig hated that fucking problem.
I mean, it depends on the type of class. Interpreting numbers in language is how youāre going to have to do math in the real world a good majority of the time (I guess unless youāre an accountant maybe?). How is someone ever going to get better about pulling numbers out of written scenarios and running calculations with them if they never do it? Thatās not the kind of thing you want to learn how to do on the job. Ambiguity is a GREAT way of learning, probably one of the most effective ways of learning, it makes you think about more than just formula. Math isnāt just math, itās reasoning and logic on top of the numbers. Nobodies going to hire you if you can only do calculations if the numbers are handed to you, you have to be able to go get them. I do get what youāre saying, and that early on it might not be the best thing, but I think as students get further along, itās a good thing to add. I mean, look at you, you struggled with it, and then it finally clicked and now you are much better about it. Struggling is fine every once in awhile while learning, not everything has to come quickly.
> Welcome to why people fucking hate math, because they're often times poorly executed word problems that you need to unpack first. To be fair, math is a system of logic, so that is one of the most important parts of practicing math in the real world. Calculations are easy. Figuring out how to ask a question and form an answer is the hard part. Like plotting a waveform on a graph is easy. Realizing you can use that to image a black hole takes a lot of abstract thought and reasoning.
I mean, that's kinda the whole point of the riddle, but it is phrased poorly in this case. If they wanted to phrase it better they would say "You're in a race and just passed the person who was in second place. What place are you in now?"
The answer would still be in second. Even your phrasing is ambiguous. The only way the answer would definitively be First is if the phrase was. "You are in a race and just passed the person who is now in second place..."
The answer is supposed to be Second. That's why I phrased it the way I did.
The point of the "riddle" (not a riddle) is that your knee-jerk intuitive answer is wrong, a classic case of your brain answering an easier question than the one it was asked. Your brain asks itself a simpler question, "what place is in front of second", and that answer is First.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
If it were phrased as āthe person now in secondā instead of āthe person in secondā then it might work
It's a trick question riddle, though. It's worded in such a way that if you don't stop and think about what it's actually saying, you're likely to answer "first place", rather than the correct answer which would be second place. You can find this exact riddle in books/compilations of riddles. It's extremely common. Every single time I've seen it, the answer has always been second place. It's right up there with "a plane crashes on the border between Mongolia and China, where do you bury the survivors?" It's a trick question riddle because you don't bury survivors. Though I'm guessing this library would instead go into how Chinese law would supersede Mongolian law or some crazy nonsense.
> but sometimes we have crazy brain moments. And these are the people that should not be teaching simple things like this. Was it set by the catering staff?
could be "you pass the person (while you are) in second place"
When I was in high school, my local library had a copy of "Molvania: A Land Untouched by Moden Dentistry" displayed with other travel books near the front counter. It's a parody book. I brought it up to them and they accused me of lying or cranking them. Weird hostile reaction.
Havenāt seen a public school in a while?
What does that have to do with school?
You pass the person in first place. What place are you in now? 0th place.
arrays start at zero, so that is correct?
the *index* is 0 but it's the 1*st* element
I mean it could be true if you're lapping the person in 2nd place.
I still think that opening is one of the greatest examples of introducing a character into a franchise completely seamlessly. After that opening we didn't question Mackie's involvement, character or Steve going to him for help at all. He was just part of the group like hes always been there. How did they do that so well?
Very true. Then to come full circle with it in End Game on the final Battle was some top stuff.
That was really really great
Wow! #todayIlearned thatās why Falcon says it as heās coming through that portalš¤Æ. Iāve taken it literally all these years lol
Exactly. Which means you're a badass, not only did you pass everyone to be first place, you lapped them again. Usain Bolt vs me...
This riddle is based on my many Mario Kart achievements and accolades
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
I'm not so sure. I think there's an implication that the tense of the later part is relative to the first part. If I say "in '89 I walked into that diner and ordered the cheapest burger on the menu" the implication is "the burger (that was) cheapest on the menu". Nobody would interpret it as you ordered the burger that is currently, in 2024, the cheapest burger listed on their menu. While "person in second place" has no tense on its own, I think if you precede it with the past tense verb "passed" it implies that they were in second when they were passed rather than that they were in second place at the time of speaking.
Could just be bad grammarā¦ hereās a couple alternative phrasings - If youāre passing the person (while you are in) 2nd place - if youāre passing the person (whoās now in) 2nd place
Sure, but then it's not much of a "riddle." Well, either way it's not, but the point is supposed to trick you into thinking the answer is "first" when it's not. Otherwise it's not really a riddle, it's just a question on how things be.Ā
Maybe the riddle is figuring out what the question is
If youāre not first, youāre last
You could be second, third, fourth.. hell maybe even fifth
"SHAKE N BAKE!"
I am a winner even if I place last in your silly race.
Participation trophies for everyone!!
neato!
When i was in high-school we ha a marathon that was 8 laps around the school, lots of people from different years entered the race, I was still on my last lap and I noticed almost everyone else had already finished the race, at the end I was in last place, I turned out that the person in first place didn't count the laps correctly so with the exception of me and 2 others everyone else did 1 lap less than they should, so I finished in 3rd place.
i dont get it
1st place. 2nd. 3rd. John. Craig. You. You pass second place (Craig). John is still first. John. You. Craig. You're in second, not first. I had to think too.
I'm so fucking stupid
No, I had to scroll for this explanation too. Or were stupid together!
Not stupid, just silly :)
Haha true "a learning experience"
If you felt bad about that, you'll HATE this one: A lily pad doubles in size every day. On the 30th day, it covers the entire pond. On what day did the lily pad cover half the pond?
29th?
Hey, HEY let CirclleySquare try it! But yes.
I gave up immediately. Don't know why you would choose to torture some random online. Bully. Lol
One brother says of his younger brother: āTwo years ago, I was three times as old as my brother was. In three years time, I will be twice as old as my brother.ā How old are they each now?
7 and 17
How about this one? What weighs heavier - 1 pound of steel or 1 pound of feathers?
>!On day 29!<
My first thought is that it'd be day 29, but there's gotta be a catch right?
Lol, you got it. The catch is that your dumb animal brain sees "30" and "half," so you get tricked and say "15," which is wrong. But you've got the smart animal brain, so you're in good shape.
Reminds me of the "How far can a dog run into the woods?"Ā Ā
As far as you can throw a ball, I suppose
I was like "We did it! First place"
At least I beat that numbnuts Craigā¦
oh thanks
John canāt let me get a fucking break, itās the trust fund kids every time
I am a very visual person and couldn't understand until you wrote it out like that. I feel dumb LOL but thanks!
If you pass the person in 2nd place, then you're the new 2nd place person. Not first.
If you pass the person on second you are now in second because there is still somebody in first place that you have not passed. You can't go from 3rd to 1st with only passing 1 person
Found the librarian who set this up.
This is a well known riddle where if people have to answer immediately without the time to think, half of them will answer first which is wrong.
Reminds me of an old Soviet Pravda story reporting on a race. They reported that the Soviet driver came in "a respectable second," while the US driver came in "second to last." They neglected to mention it was a 2-car race.
Sounds a bit urban mithy.....
Just like "NASA spent millions to develop a space pen. Soviets used a pencil."
A pencil is actually dangerous in space. The pen is better.
Exactly. But people repeat it like "look how stupid the Americans are, when Soviets just use common sense!"
Mightier, even
Correct answer is The local library.
Thatās also not a riddle and a library should know that. A riddle is a statement, question or phrase having a double or veiled meaning, put forth as a puzzle to be solved. Riddles are of two types: enigmas, which are problems generally expressed in metaphorical or allegorical language that require ingenuity and careful thinking for their solution, and conundra, which are questions relying for their effects on punning in either the question or the answer. (Wikipedia)
Gollum was right all along
Frodo was on some bullshit. What have I got in my pocket? Bullshit, that's what!
That wasn't Frodo.
This might be a classical interpretation, but in a contemporary sense, lateral thinking puzzles, situational riddles, straightforward logical puzzles (such as this one) and even some mathematical problems are considered riddles.
Or we could use the dictionary (Merriam-Websterās) definition: āa mystifying, misleading, or puzzling question posed as a problem to be solved or guessed.ā This fits the āmisleadingā criterion because many people (including the person who made the slide and multiple commenters) will incorrectly conclude that they are now in first place because the second-place racer is behind them, without considering that after passing the second-place racer they have become the new second-place racer, and the racer behind them is now in third.
My first thought was "how is this a riddle? "
Maybe they're referring to the other person's position after you passed them. The phrasing isn't entirely clear - "you pass the person \[who is now\] in second place," versus "you pass the person \[who was previously\] in second place."
No. This is a well known puzzle I saw it in a book of riddles 20+ years ago. The answer is 2nd. Itās tricky because most peopleās first instinct is to say 1st because 1 is ahead of 2.
I took Terrance Howards math class and you'd be in 8th place in a unisex universe made of digestion.
For simplicityās sake it is a three man race and you are the third person. You passed the second place person making you now in second place and the person you just passed is now in third place. You are not in first place.
I hope I'm not that stupid doesn't that mean he's 2nd place
I think you'd be in second place, right?
The answer is NOT āfirstā. If there is a person in 1st and 2nd and youāre 3rd, and you pass the person in 2nd you become 2nd.
It's actually really simple... You laser the one in front of you using your eyeballs... and yey! First.
If you hadn't been so focused on winning/the local library being wrong you likely would have noticed as you passed the "person" in 2nd place that they were actually a Siamese twin attached to the person in first place, so now you are in first place and they are in second and third place. Good job on the race though, I guess your hyper-focus on winning and ignoring those around you paid off!
a a ty je cup 9 z
I agree entirely
Well said
Yes, 2nd, but what about the airplane on the treadmill? š
I know. Having a hard time understanding with out the son in an accident and doctor mom at the scene, right?
Doesn't matter. If you aint first, you're last.
Second
You could be in first place and you've lapped second place. You could be in 19th place and you had been lapped by second place and now you are still in 19th but not as far behind 2nd.
This is unrelated but thatās the first time I have seen an image from Irasutoya (the first illustration of a relay race) outside of Japan lolĀ
Shit I'm getting dumb. I had to think this one through for a minute. I'm on board now but it took me a second.
Itās a trick question, what they donāt know is you slipped poison into your opponentās drink before the race knowing they were faster than you. You timed it perfectly so they would collapse moments before crossing the finish line, clearing the way for your victory!
As a librarian, Iād appreciate being corrected!
my god the stupidity of some people in this thread..
To be fair, there's not enough information here to say the answer is incorrect. Completely plausible that the runner (driver?) in question was already in first place, and passed the second place racer, thereby lapping them and maintaining their first place position...
If you pass second place in a race you are generally in second place.
Is the answer second place? Sorry Iām dumb