??!! Ghost Whisperer? WTF?!?
posted by August 7 at 9:18 AM
onUmm…Dear Science? Can you hear me? Hello? Well. I’m begging, you. Please (PLEASE!) explain to me in a rational and relatively coherent manner (that involves as little math as possible) exactly HOW THIS SCARY THING WORKS?
Really? HOW?
Honestly, Science. I need you. I don’t get it, and I’m getting a little freaked out over here.
Explain!?!
Comments
The answer to the math problem will always be a multiple of 9. Look at the number chart, and you'll see that every multiple of 9 has the same symbol next to it.
(The symbols are shuffled each time the page loads, but whichever symbol winds up next to all the products of 9 is the symbol the crystal ball will show.)
Whatever you pick, your result will be divisible by 9. Every multiple of 9 has the same symbol.
I think this has been Slogged at least once before.
It's a math trick. The variation I've seen before makes you keep adding digits until you arrive at ... 9.
(10a + b) - (a + b) = 9a
Thus, the answer will always be divisible by 9.
thank you gentelmen. thank you. and i was just waiting for SOMEONE to say "i think this has been slogged before" and/or "yawn" etc., so gabriel darling? you win!!! hooray!
ps--math is scarrier than ghosts.
I'm no mathematician, but this thing is pretty easy to figure out by simple observation. The sum of every possible addition/subtraction operation is divisible by 9, so every 9th number shares the same symbol: 9, 18, 27, 36, 45, 54, 63, 72, 81. (I'm sure someone more math minded than me can express this formula in 5-7 characters.) No matter what number you have in mind, the same symbol will come up.
Your original number can be thought of as (10x + y). That means to calculate the number they ask you you have to do [(10x + y) - (x + y)]. Using algebra you get 9x. Look closely at the chart. Every multiple of 9 has the same symbol. They switch out every time you reload, but the symbol is the same for all 9 of those numbers.
It's not even a math trick. It's really a trick that you won't notice the same symbol is repeated over and over in the grid.
Then there's the old "Pick a two-digit number with two different odd digits and OMG YOU PICKED 37!"
Of course, there are only 20 numbers that match that and more people pick 37 than anything else, so it's just odds. That's a little weirder, though, because it's not mathematically provable, it's just bizarre human nature that no one pickes 13 or 95.
I hate reality.
So, every six months a new Stranger employee will be hornswoggled by the same simple math trick? For eternity?
Yes, Fnarf. But I already won that prize (@6).
fnarf! gabriel! not anymore! i've discoverd a math trick (based on multiples of 9) that will now allow me to hold the entire contents of slog, since the beginning of time, in my head! you'll never get another repeat from me! again! whatever!
It's not the repeat posting that gets me, Adrian. Did you know "gullible" isn't in the dictionary? It's true! Go ask Amy Kate and she'll show you.
oh, fnarf. making fun of people who don't get math is just mean. go pick on fat people. and, for ze record, i never said i thought the freaking thing was supernatural, i merely asked someone to please explain how it worked to me. so clearly i knew it was a TRICK. jesus. i'm not retarded. or, not THAT retarded.
Adrian's not so bad at math, really. He can consistently count to 21.
42, when I'm around.
Adrian's not so bad at math. He can consistently count to 21.
42, when I'm in the room.
The real answer is that everybody picks the number 69. HA!
It's not really that you're a "person who doesn't get math". You're just dumb. Go back to posting about Jake Gyllenhaal.
it's too true. what can i say? diaboli virtus in lumbas est.
i didn't really bother with the map...once i realized the chart changed each time you reloaded it...i knew it was rigged...if the chart didn't change...this would be amazing!
Lots of Adrian! bashing in this thread. Breaks my heart.
On the other hand, computers really can read brain waves, as demonstrated here:
I was not bashing Adrian. I was bantering with him. This is my only form of pleasure.
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