Crashing Light Bulbs
You are living in a 100-floor apartment block. You know that there is one floor in the block, such that if you drop a light bulb from there or anywhere higher, it will crash upon hitting the ground. If you drop a light bulb from any floor underneath it however, the light bulb will remain intact. If you have two light bulbs at your disposal, how many drop attempts do you need such that you can surely find which the floor in question is?
The answer is 14 drops. You can do this by throwing the first bulb from floors 14, 27, 39, 50, 60, 69, 77, 84, 90, 95, 99, 100 (notice that the difference decreases always by 1) until it crashes and then start throwing the second bulb from the floors in between. For example, if the first bulb crashes at floor 69, you start throwing the second bulb from floors 61, 62, 63, etc. This way the total number of throws would be always at most 14.
Proving that 14 is optimal is done using the same logic. In order to use at most 13 throws, the first throw should be made from floor 13 or lower. The second throw should be made from floor 13+12 or lower, the third throw should be made from floor 13+12+11 or lower, etc. Continuing with the same argument, we conclude that the 13th drop should be made from floor 13+12+…+2+1=91 or lower. However, if the first light bulb does not crash after the last throw, you will not be able to find out which number among 92-100 is X.
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