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The grass is always greener... (Posted on 2004-05-06) Difficulty: 3 of 5
You are told there are two envelopes. One contains twice as much money as the other one. You pick one but are allowed to change your mind after picking it. (You are equally likely to pick the one with less money as the one with more money.)

To figure out how much on average the other envelope should contain, one might average x/2 and 2x because one is equally likely to pick one as picking the other. Since this comes out to 5x/4, one might always change his or her mind. But wouldn't this end up with one never making up his or her mind?

No Solution Yet Submitted by Gamer    
Rating: 3.9444 (18 votes)

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No Subject | Comment 13 of 46 |
First of all, the values assigned to the values of money in the envelopes are incorrect.  If one contains X dollars, then the other contains either 2X dollars (assuming X is smaller) or X/2 (assuming X is greater).  Second of all, people would make up their minds eventually!  No one is going to spend all of their lives picking an envelope!
  Posted by Dana on 2004-06-01 18:13:24
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