There were once three friends. Abe is a Knight, Bill is a Liar, and Carl is neither, having been brought up in a foreign country. (This means he can either lie or tell the truth depending on what he feels like.)

One day, the three were sitting on a bench when the king's herald stopped by to deliver a message to one of them.

He asked the man sitting on the left side of the bench:

"Who's that sitting in the middle? To which the man replied: "Why that's Abe".

He then asked the man in the middle directly:

"What's your name?" and got the answer "My name's Carl."

Confused, he asked the man on the right:

"Who is that sitting in the middle?" and was immediately told: "That's Bill, of course!"

Can you help the king's herald figure out who is who?

let's label the seats 123 and determine the truth tellers and the liars.

if 2 is Abe, then:
123
TFF (1 is truth teller, 2 and 3 are liars)
This would force Abe (the truth teller) to seat 1 which contradicts 1's answer.

if 2 was Carl, then:
123
FTF
This would force Abe to be in seat 2, which would contradict 2's answer.

If 2 was Bill, then:
123
FFT
This would force Abe to be in seat 3. Carl sat in seat 1 and lied to the king (the dastard!)

So, sitting from left to right:
Carl, Bill, Abe

Posted by Happy on 2002-06-11 12:48:26