Welcome to The Puzzler. Every week, there are 2 new puzzles related to my passion: math, logic, and thinking. The first puzzle will be The Puzzler Quik, meant for those who crave something fun-sized. The second puzzle will be The Puzzler Think, meant for those who love to ponder. The answers will be posted in next week’s column. Don’t forget to submit your answer for a potential shout-out in the next edition of the Puzzler.
Puzzler Quik
What is the product of all of the positive factors of 12?
Puzzled?
Try listing out all the factors of 12.
The factors are 1,2,3,4,6,12
How many divisors does the number 81 have?
Puzzled?
Try listing out the prime factors of 81.
81 is a power of 3!
ANSWERS TO LAST WEEK’S PUZZLERS
Last Week's Puzzler Quik
Illya from California was the winner of this shout-out!
The digits 0 through 9 all follow the same pattern there is exactly 1 occurrence of each digit for every ten numbers.
- For instance the digit 2 appears once between 10 and 19, at 12. And 2 appears once between, 30 and 39 at 32.
- However, each of the digits 1 through 9 also appear in other numbers in the tens and hundreds place.
Again, let’s look at 2 which appears in 20, 21, 22, 23, etc.. as well as 200, 201, 202, 203.
So to figure out how to answer the first riddle you had to see what distinguishes the number 1? Only that we are including 1,000 which would be the first ‘1’ in a new series of ten! In other words, the digit 1 only has a single extra occurrence (301 occurrences) compared to 2 or 3 or 9 which each have exactly 300 occurrences.
Last Week's Puzzler Think
The shoutout for this problem goes to Jama from Georgia!
Continued from ThePuzzlr quik…
The reason that zero has the least (BY FAR at only 192 occurrences) is because zero does not have any equivalents to 22, 33, 44, 222, 333 etc. Also, during Zero’s hundred’s place, we omit the zero.
When will puzzle for week 43 arrive?
It is already out! You can find it here: https://thepuzzlr.com/the-puzzler-43/