Knights and Coins

Bob and Jane are taking turns, placing knights and coins respectively on a chessboard. If Bob is allowed to place a knight only on an empty square which is not attacked by another knight, how many pieces at most can he place before running out of moves? Assume that Jane starts second and plays optimally, trying to prevent Bob from placing knights on the board.

Light Bulbs in the Attic

There are three light bulbs in your attic. All of them are turned off and their switches are installed downstairs. You can play with the switches as much as you want and after that, you can visit the attic above just once. How can you find out which switch to which bulb corresponds?

The Twelve Matchsticks

With 12 matches you can easily create a shape with area 9 and a shape with area 5, as shown on the picture below. Can you rearrange the 12 matchsticks, so that they encompass an area of 4?

Remark: You should have only one resulting shape and no matches should be unused.

Programmers and Coins

One programmer draws on a sheet of paper several circles in a line, representing coins, and puts his thumb on the first circle, covering the rest with his hand. Then he asks another programmer to guess how many different head-tail combinations are possible if someone flips all the (imaginary) coins on the paper. The second programmer, without knowing the number of circles, takes the pen and writes down a number. Then the first programmer lifts his hand and sees that the correct answer is written on the paper. How did the second programmer manage to do this?

Joseph’s Machines

Joseph Herscher is a kinetic artist and a YouTube personality, who specializes in creating intricate Rude Goldberg machines out of everyday objects. Some of his most popular machines are “The Page Turner”“The Dresser”, and “The Cake Server” which you can see below. Joseph has been sharing his inventions on YouTube for more than 10 years, and you can explore all of them on his official channel. Who knows, maybe he will inspire you to start making fascinating Rude Goldberg machines as well!