[flagged]
Note, I think people sharing this kind of thing _do_ tend to be smug, but of course if the first time they heard it they were also confused, they have no reason to be smug.
What I was trying to get at is there are poor reproductions used to trick people that go around and must be a big part of the meme.
Only if (in fact) it's an independent choice. It's not.
If the prizes had been juggled behind the curtain after one door had been opened, then you'd be right. But the "weird setup", which is the point of the puzzle, makes it clear.
Let's be real here: the point here for most of us is to think "oh it's 50:50", be proved wrong, enjoy being humbled, learn something new about how to interrogate a problem, and enjoy setting this puzzle to younger thinkers in the future.
Not to attack the (very closely-worded) description of the problem because you're upset to be wrong.
It's a probability puzzle and a character test for thinkers.
I find the problem interesting for its historically poor examples floating on the internet and their application socially beyond a math puzzle.
That’s my view and point in commenting.
This was one I could never get my head around, so I simply listed all the possible scenarios, and counted the number of car vs. goat results. Sure enough, it worked out to 2/3 and my mind was blown.
Don’t believe me, go search for memes presenting the problem. It’s been on the internet for decades at this point.
The setup is near always to send a poor rewrite then link you to a story of Marilyn von Savant when you get 50-50. It’s an age old internet troll.
I think this story in its entirety says a lot about ignoring the importance of good technical writing… and how people on the internet love tricking others to feel “right.”
Of the cited hate mail Savant received, I have to wonder how many were setup with poor writing on the topic.
Have you spent at least equal time considering, given the tenor of much of it, how many were instead willingly exposing their simple misogyny?
You might be a bit younger than me, but I remember this well, and I remember this being one of my first introductions into the idea that men who are wrong will lash out with misogyny if it is a woman who proves their ignorance. Even academics.
I guess it all depends on your perspective. I see a lot more people on the internet piling on with nitpicks to avoid feeling "wrong."
The article includes the specific wording that Savant used in her column. It seems pretty clear.
> I think this story in its entirety says a lot about ignoring the importance of good technical writing… and how people on the internet love tricking others to feel “right.”
... or, since the column that provoked all hate mail was in 1990 and people saw it in print publications, perhaps it says very little about the internet. And given the higher effort of writing an actual letter to Savant then vs now, it says that people's desire to "correct" a woman is pretty high.