What's the average of 5 MPG and 10 MPG?
The math isn't quite obvious to me, but if you go out camping and get 5 MPG on the way to the campground and turn around and get 10 MGP on the way back, your average MPG won't be 7.5 as you would expe...
Forum Discussion
zach477 wrote:bob_nestor wrote:
It's a bit like that old math puzzle: 3 men go to a hotel and rent a room for $30 where they each pay $10. The desk clerk realizes the room is only $25 so he sends the bellboy to their room with a $5 refund. The bellboy realizes he can't split the $5 evenly, so he pockets $2 and give each man $1 back. Now the men have each paid $9 for the room ($10 - the $1 they got back), for a total of $27 and the bellboy pocketed $2 for a grand total of $29. Where did the other $1 go?
The part in bold is the problem. It's mis-stated to be confusing.
They each paid 9 bucks which is 27, yes, but you don't add the bell boy's 2 dollars to that.
They each paid 9 for a total of 27. 25 of it went to the hotel and 2 to the bell boy for a total of 27. The remaining three went back into their pockets.
That's correct. The puzzle is created by stating the problem in such a way that one of the basic laws of math are violated. Much the same as the original MPG calculation that was done which started this thread.
