A master puzzler once showed his apprentice the following 3 numbers:

1 5 9

and asked him "Do you know what the next one is?"

The apprentice replied, "With only three numbers it would be very difficult to figure out the sequence but it appears to be an arithmetic series with each next number being 4 more than the previous."

The master puzzler smiled knowingly and said "Some say the fourth number of the sequence is 3 times the second number, others claim it is the sum of the first three. Do you know the fifth, which is also the last number?"

The apprentice wrote four numbers on a piece of paper and was totally baffled as to what the last number could be. "Why would you think I should know this?" he asked.

The master answered "Because you like to read."

21

The answer was given away in the last line, 'Because you like to read'... Here's how i got it.

The fourth number is 15. The master had just showed 2 ways to arrive at the same number. Now the sequence is 1, 5, 9, 15, ?

Also the sequence is just 5 numbers long... and the last line reveals it has something to do with words... which leads to vowels... 5 vowels !!!

a = 1 , e = 5 , i = 9 , o = 15 , u = 21

 

Posted by Syzygy on 2004-12-22 13:03:35