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?

Abe is honest and would never claim to be Carl, so Abe is not the man in the middle. Also, Abe would never say that somebody else is him, so he is not the man on the left. Therefore, Abe is on the right. His statement is true, so Bill is in the middle. That leaves Carl to be on the left.

Posted by Math Man on 2012-08-23 10:33:50