CaptainEd

All true. Of course, he may have died before finishing...Still, I totally agree we don't have a case against her or anybody else, merely a hint. (Until someone sees deep into the ramified labyrinth of Y-san's creation).

THe prior B-kun story ("Study in Scarlet", I don't have a link to it, but it's still in this forum) mentions, but does not describe, a female of some importance to B-kun. On the other hand, the Study in Scarlet is sure to have had Red herrings...on the other other hand, Violet begins with "V"...

What an interesting puzzle! Unfortunately, I don't see how to make incremental progress on it.

It's true that you know what's important, a lot better than I do. So, assuming your comment is intended as an explanation as to why my inference was wrong...

As the Prof said (but with more accurate phonetics), "inconshievable"!

I enjoy Y-san's question about B,A,C and agree with her answer. But I doubt that the Witch has a titration measure of the Wizard's potion, so I see risk in Y's proposal.

As the Witch's lawyer, I would point out that the outcome of the competition was to discover the best PERSON, not the best POISON. Otherwise, wouldn't the Cruel Tyrant be really really upset to find that both competitors had brought Water to the competition? In fact, this result also yields the best POISON, as the Witch may know she can do better than the Wizard, but does she have a numerical measure? Would she make her own antidote anything less than her very strongest poison? The C. T. should be glad to see what the Witch uses when she wants to save her own hide. However, as a humble Denizen, I'm eager to solve the problem you had in mind. Does your comment imply that my solution is not a winner?

I see that other solutions have had the triangles impinge on the square, without connecting to it. My question about the 33 solution is that I imagine the top and bottom squares collapsing to the left and right respectively, while still remaining pinched between the crab claws. So I think the squares are not actually firmed up.

But I clearly can't get into the minds of the Ugarits-- I interpreted the phrase "...to mine an equal number of cubic stones" to mean that A, B, and C are to have the same number of stones. If so, I'm stumped about the following. it sounds like C's square was built around B's square was built around A's square, and yet C used fewer stones than B, and B and A used the same number of stones. Do you feel that each person built a complete square? Or do you think each person built some walls, and that the combined assemblage exhibited 3 interlocking squares? Or something else?

A more compact form of this issue appeared in an ancient Moon Mullins cartoon, someone asks Lord Plushbottom how he keeps his bowler hat looking so beautiful year in, year out. He said, "I polish it daily, I take great care not to get it dirty, and I exchange it frequently at restaurants."

Shinkansen, it strikes me that you are a Bullet in Training. We need you to go faster in answering our questions! As plasmid asked, what is the context of this puzzle--where did it come from, what else was near it? We are leaning forward in our seats, flying towards an unseen destination, eager to leave the tunnel! Please shed some light so that we can see the right track, Shinkansen!

It appears that Rashunal's analysis and decision is the same used by people evaluating insurance: should I pay a low cost with high probability, or accept a high cost at low probability? So does the argument on the video. The presence of the bunny suit might make one question the notion that the OP is concerned about logic.

Shinkansen, we can go farther and faster with you if you can provide answers to Plasmid's questions!

(edit--Curr3nt has now answered better than I was going to)

I'm perplexed. Bushindo's proof has the same form as Euclid's proof of the infinity of primes: for each one that is alleged to be the largest one, there's one that's larger. What's wrong with that?

edit: gack, formatting.

Phil, imagine competitor P, who beat everybody but Q, and Q lost to everybody but P. Q is a tournament king, even though he lost to almost everybody.

Couple of questions about definitions: (1) "to quickly find any single tournament king": Does this mean you'll come to me and say, "find me a tournament king"? Or does it mean "Here is a single competitor: see if he/she is a tournament king"? I'm assuming the former. (2) Method II has a list of lists. Each list operation counts as 1 operation. I assume that means stepping through the main list as well. How is it sorted? Do we get to declare as part of the solution how we wish it were sorted? Do we have to include any such sorting of that list as part of the algorithm's time? (Yes, Method III also has such a list--same questions applies)

Phil taught me all I know...