Conundrum

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Wirefeeders
A challenging game of untangling cords, see Chinese rings

Vexiere ( Latin vexare , plague, torment ' ) are puzzles with the task of removing or adding a part, i.e. to unravel something or to put something together in a meaningful way. There are puzzles made of various materials, e.g. B. from bent wires, cords or wooden balls.

history

The games had their first widespread use towards the end of the 19th century with the general puzzle craze. A large number of puzzles that are still known today have their origins in this time.

Before that, convolutions were generally known in the locksmith's art. Mainly to make security locks even more secure, devices were built in that had to be brought into a certain position known only to the owner in order to then expose the actual lock. They were called cone locks .

Both in literary studies and in film criticism , the term Vexier is also seen as a term for complex intellectual puzzles such as in the films Last Year in Marienbad (here especially Marienbad ) or The Draftsman's Contract .

Variations

Another type of puzzle are ring puzzles, which also include the Chinese rings . In these games, an elongated wire loop has to be detached from a mesh of rings and wires. The number of steps required for this is often exponential to the number of loops.

example

Starting point, for example, a puzzling one

A well-known conundrum is the riddle known partly as the Berchtesgaden problem (also known as the head of nails, magic nails or nail test ). It is a conundrum that, due to the material used, is often demonstrated by carpenters at topping-out ceremonies.

Task

A normal nail (preferably also a carpenter's nail ) is hammered a few millimeters into a board . The task now is to attach a larger number of further nails or the maximum possible number of nails to this one nail in such a way that they touch neither the floor nor the board, but only the other nails. This must be achieved without the aid of other objects, such as a magnet . Furthermore, the nails must not be touched or influenced by any part of the body during the balancing act.

Solution for example puzzling

  • Solution construction

  • 10 nail solution

  • 50 nail solution

On a ground nail, nails are positioned transversely with alternating heads on both sides of the ground nail. Finally, a nail is placed parallel to the base nail. Now the entire construct must be lifted by the two ground nails and placed on the head of the nailed in, paying attention to the center of gravity . Due to the hanging nails, the overall center of gravity of the arrangement is below the suspension point, so that a stable position is achieved. The puzzle is solved. It is often assumed that a stable paired arrangement only forms a solution with an even number of balancing nails or that there must be a clear upper limit of nails in the solution due to the fixed length of the two supporting nails. The solution shown with 50 carpenter's nails refutes such errors. In fact, many more nails could similarly balance on the driven nail.

See also

literature

  • Pieter van Delft and Jack Botermans: Mind Games of the World . Weltbild, 2004, ISBN 3-8289-2032-2 .

Web links

Commons : various conundrums  - collections of images, videos and audio files