The Sphinx's Lair - 2020-08-31

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1:37 AM

0

Q: Lawbreaking by the numbers

Special Agent Benford has been stymied by a third unsolved case of miscreant creative accounting and will voluntarily retire from the Fraudulent Numbers Task Force. Benford’s ability to detect falsified accounting sheets by merely counting the first digits of numerical entries is so renown that a...

probability number-property

3 hours later…

4:28 AM

0

Q: Pick the correct shape for these patterns

Does anyone know the correct shape that corresponds to the following patterns of shapes for each image and explain why? Part A Part B

1 hour later…

5:43 AM

1

Q: Twenty Troubles

What does this list represent? 20 (e.g.) 20 (exactly) 20 (compared to 350) 20 (compared to 3) 20 (e.g.) 20 (when scored by the NY Giants in 1991) 20...21...22...23... 20 (when the last in this list)

knowledge number-sequence

0

Q: Orchard planting problem for circles

The classic Orchard planting problem asks for the maximum number of 3-point straight lines attainable from a configuration of $n$ points drawn on a plane. Here we are interested in a variant of this problem. What is the maximum number of 4-point circles attainable from a configuration of 10 poin...

mathematics geometry combinatorics

3 hours later…

8:37 AM

0

Q: Variant of the hardest logic puzzle ever

I have landed on a new planet and there are 4 people there. One of them is a truth teller and they always speak the truth. The other is a liar and they always lie. The other 2 are random and they sometimes say yes and sometimes say no, all at random. Each of them knows everything about all the ot...

logical-deduction

2 hours later…

Gareth McCaughan

10:16 AM

CCCC hints: 1. This clue involves a rather obscure word, but that word is neither the answer nor a substring of the answer. 2. The first letter is O. 3. I have done something slightly nonstandard in the wordplay. 4. The definition is a single word. 5. The third letter is E. 6. The rather obscure word is longer than the answer.

10:27 AM

looks like the record so far for the most CCCC hints required in the sphinx's lair

Gareth McCaughan

That may just indicate that I'm giving not-super-informative hints.

Also, it genuinely is a tough clue.

10:46 AM

@GarethMcCaughan Def Frank = "Overt". Wife's condition = Coverture has no (minus) "cure" -> overt

i guess the non-standard part is that you don't just delete one substring, but two of the word

Gareth McCaughan

10:57 AM

@LukasRotter Yes! Well done.

@LukasRotter Right. I personally think it's fine to do that, especially when the substrings are at the very start and the very end so it's easy to see them (as it were), but I'm not sure to what extent the rest of the world agrees.

I fail to create a sensible wording of the clue, but oh well

CCCC: Hand over, insult past and send back (7)

11:39 AM

@LukasRotter is this DELIVER<?

@Ankoganit Correct!

12:20 PM

CCCC: This person specializes in counting and optimizing bitcoin — it's amoral, misguided! (16)

Gareth McCaughan

@Ankoganit COMBINATORIALIST obviously

(Nice surface!)

Yep

(thanks :D)

Gareth McCaughan

Unfortunately I am about to be AFK for a few hours, so the next clue won't be posted as promptly as the last two...

12:58 PM

@Ankoganit danggg

@oAlt hehe

2 hours later…

2:44 PM

@LukasRotter Darn it was OVERT!!! Damn it

Aug 27 at 22:30, by North Læraðr

I'm just salty OVERT didn't go anywhere

Hnnnng

Darn it!!!!!!!!!

AHHHHHHHHH

You don't know how annoyed I am

I'm even saltier

:(

Can you pickle this for me?

@Mithical Pickle?

2:48 PM

pickle

What do you mean?

...you pickle things with a lot of salt...

Hmph

Imma pickle you

@Mithical Go pickle it yourself, Mith

hmph. your salt is useless

Great observation

2:54 PM

pickles are disgusting and should be banned from Planet Earth

@bobble Actually amen

HEATHENS

@bobble Unless a man turns himself into one

Well... maybe not all of them

I unfriend anyone who doesn't remove the pickles on their burgers

Red flag

2:54 PM

@LukasRotter OOP

There's Korean pickling, which is GREAT

Pickled radish... mmmmm

Kimchi

Pickled cucumbers

BUT THEY'RE NOT THE SAME AS PICKLES

@Mithical Speak for yourself!! (╯°□°)╯︵ ┻━┻

if you do not like pickles you have no taste and are uncultured. that is all i will say on the matter

i smell war

@Mithical How dare you

The only pickled items worthy of my taste buds are

Korean food

and Relish

@Mithical heh, un-cultured

:)

3:01 PM

@Ankoganit Lol

Exclamation of disgust amid plea for help - Australian ensigns' leaders are missing disgusting, slimy foods. (7)

1

Q: Rabbit's favorite beverage

Your best friend, the rabbit, was coming out of his burrow one morning and you happened to be nearby! "Good morning, friend!" said the rabbit. "Good morning!" "I've got a puzzle for you... Think you can get me something to drink?" "Hmm... What do you mean?" you replied. The rabbit merely chuckled...

enigmatic-puzzle

3:20 PM

@bobble Pickles

Can't argue with the definition

@bobble I have zero clue what the wordplay is

Exclamation of disgust = ICK

Please for help = PLE(-a)S(-e) -> Australian ensigns' leaders are missing

Ah

"amid" is an insertion indicator

3:24 PM

*pleas for help

yea

Hemorrhoids overwhelm back, bottoms disgorging disgusting, slimy foods (7)

I also do not like pickles.

But still...I'll see myself out...

@JeremyDover now I'm having trouble with the wordplay

I don't recommend Googling, but "piles" is another term for hemorrhoids.

ah. I will not Google

3:30 PM

Harvest the French for disgusting, slimy foods (7)

I'm not sure the wordplay is actually legal

looks legal to me. But then, I'm not Deus.

Pick + les?

Yeah, I think it's good.

I get a news roundup in my email every morning, and, I kid you not, one of the headlines is "Time enough to pickle"

"There is still a week until Labor Day — enough time to make pickles, an excellent accompaniment to grilled main dishes, for the long weekend’s festivities."

@bobble LMAO

@Mithical what have you done

3:36 PM

Let's stop with the discrimination of pickles for a moment and appreciate them for where they thrive at -> In the trashcan

Disgusting foods oddly kill when coated with bad spice (7)

Pickles still stink up the house when in the trashcan. Proper place -> never existing

so you're suggesting genocide?

@LukasRotter: not sure there is a safe response. I do stand by original statement.

@LukasRotter Aren't they already dead?

thats what they want you to believe

3:45 PM

You're both dead to me.

how 'bout me? @Mithical?

yes, you as well, and @North

@Mithical Takes one to know one

I'm a tree. Pickling something is like... I don't know, mummifying a body or something

It's gross

Okay @bobble I need some more math help bc my teacher won't teach

unfortunately I'm in the middle of Gov right now, can't concentrate on much else

Eek okay

Anyone else that can explain absolute value function tranformation real quick

Gareth McCaughan

3:56 PM

what about it?

So how do you figure out like f(x)=1/x?

Hold on

Let me pull up an example

user image

Gareth McCaughan

Those appear to be the same function.

So basically how do I take g(x) here and transform it 1/x?

I answered the first part of the question, it was asking which absolute function would make that transformation

Gareth McCaughan

I'm not sure exactly what you mean by "transform it 1/x"? Do you mean just taking 1/g(x), or am I misunderstanding?

Yes

Gareth McCaughan

4:00 PM

So are they asking you to plot what its graph will look like, or what?

A rough sketch of what it would look like. I'm not sure how 1/(f(x) functions in general though

Gareth McCaughan

Just think about what it does at each point. If f(x) is very small then 1/f(x) is very large. If f(x) is very large then 1/f(x) is very small. Etc.

It's a bit tricky if you have something like the g and h in your plot here that's tending to 0 as x -> oo, because clearly that means that 1/g(x) will -> oo, but it's not so obvious exactly how it does so, if you see what I mean. Do you have actual formulae for the functions you're working with, or just graphs?

No, just the graph

She explain 1/f(x) as

taking the reciprocal and making it the vertical asymptote or something? Ugh

Gareth McCaughan

You're taking the reciprocal of each individual value of f(x). So you'll get a vertical asymptote if f(x)=0.

My brain hurts....

4:06 PM

dear gods, gov teacher just said that the civil war was largely about states' rights

Drop

Drop it right now

DROP THAT CLASS RIGHT NOW

Seems accurate to me

Gareth McCaughan

It's controversial at best.

If you look at things actually written by the official representatives of the Southern states, they frequently say in so many words "this is all about slavery".

I mean written at the time, to be clear.

State's rights about what

Gareth McCaughan

But of course no conflict is ever only about one thing, so of course they also spun it as "we're fighting against the awful oppression of the North".

4:09 PM

@NorthLæraðr to set their own laws about slavery

@Mithical Yeah. But some ppl spin it so that it doesn't involve slavery

usually the spin is about tariffs

Gareth McCaughan

And no doubt there were other things that Southern states wanted to do / not do, and that the US government didn't allow, so it isn't 100% wrong to say that the war was "about states' rights". But far and away the most important states' right that actually provoked the Southern succession was the right for their citizens to "own" other human beings and exploit them.

@bobble "The greedy Northerners set taxes because they were jealous. Cotton, etc. etc."

KING COTTON SHALL RULE ALL

4:11 PM

I mean not like the North was great. Exploitation of workers, racism, and some more

My friend brought up a really good point the other day. He was like, "so the South believed in slavery. But why did they beat the crap out of so many of their slaves? If they're property, don't you treat them semi-decently? It's not like you beat the crap out of your oxen like that"

They did take into account slave health - the really dangerous, likely-to-kill you tasks were given to underpaid immigrant workers

Because sending long-term investments to their death is bad for buisness

The beating was mostly to provoke fear, try to keep them from running/slacking off

Weird

Somehow this chatroom has gone from pickles to math to the Civil War in just over an hour

Sounds like a successful day in The Sphinx's Lair if you ask me

Underpaid immigrant workers?

were indentured servants still around back then

4:19 PM

I didn't even get my math question answered thumbs up. But it's okay, I don't even know where I'm confused at

@Avi No, just underpaid workers

Like

Severely underpaid workers

Though underpaying employees were more of the North's thing

I see, I'll make sure not to work for you then

Yeah. My rates are dirt poor

You Wood Not Believe How Low These Rates Can Go

Hahaha

0

Q: Sorry, I'm new. to this SE

spoil the unlukcy number for this text fbeel, V'z arj fb gvuf jvyy or fchre rm. 3 > 4 and 4 > 3 ^\w|[A-Z]|[^w](?=i) is the whole clue minus a letter. Find it on the lake bed! Goodbye!

cipher lateral-thinking

2 hours later…

6:10 PM

0

Q: My Latest Password

-What is your password?- my niece asks me. -It is a four digit number. -I know that. -It is divisible by precisely three primes. -Tell me more. -It has at least one common divisor with precisely eight of the other 23 4-digit numbers that can be formed with those very same digits. A few hours late...

arithmetic primes

7:00 PM

0

Q: my prefix can turn to sand, my suffix is at hand

my prefix can turn to sand my suffix is at hand my infix is a French end the whole is a famous movie

riddle word language music

7:24 PM

0

Q: Another what am I?

The structure is a hint as well, the punctuation is irrelevant in that sense. tap a cabalistical sum; counterdemonstrations, fabrications, I antienthusiastically circumstantiate unexceptionability What am I?

riddle wordplay

2 hours later…

Gareth McCaughan

9:44 PM

CCCC: Most beautiful art arriving; rest is to be collected (9)

10:18 PM

Somehow when I give answers for discussion questions my writing gets agonizingly stuffy.

1 hour later…

11:41 PM

if the definition is "to be collected", would it have to be in past tense?

or if it is "is to be collected" does it have to be in present tense?

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Aug '2031

The Sphinx's Lair

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