Logic puzzles. Who loves 'em?

[Linty Fresh]

So I come across this thread (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=329097) the other day, and I sit down and bang out the answer in about 2 hours. Einstein's fish was the first logic puzzle I've done in a few years, and I forgot how much I love them.

My favorite type of puzzle is where they don't tell you any attributes the characters have, just the attributes they don't have. I like these, because they are so damned difficult to narrow down. I've tried three of them over the years, and I have yet to solve one completely right (though I'm starting to get close).

So who else does? Any particular kind? Do you make your own little logic grids on Excel, or do you write the details on lined paper and try to fit them together like a jigsaw puzzle? Do you have any tricks or tips?

[twickster]

I'd like 'em a lot more if I didn't have two magazines' worth to edit in the next three weeks.

**grumble grumble grumble**

[hajario]

I used to love them when I was a kid. It really served me well when I got a nearly perfect score on the logic section of the GRE many years later.

[Linty Fresh]

I used to love them when I was a kid. It really served me well when I got a nearly perfect score on the logic section of the GRE many years later.

That actually brings up another point I wanted to address in the OP. Do you find that getting good at logic puzzles helps your thinking in everyday life?

It seems to me that the ultimate fan would be one who learns to solve the puzzles just by reading them without writing anything down. That would be the jedi puzzle fan. He'd also probably be a little bit screwed up.

[Lsura]

I go through phases where I work them constantly and then I won't work any for six months or so, but when I do work them, I enjoy them.

I think they definitely helped me when I took the GRE - I was just finishing a puzzle-working phase when I made the decision to take it and apply to grad school, and for some of the ones in that section (I think the analytical section, but I don't remember), having worked them made it very easy to figure out what couldn't be the answer to the question. I ended up scoring very well on that section.

[hajario]

That actually brings up another point I wanted to address in the OP. Do you find that getting good at logic puzzles helps your thinking in everyday life?

The fact that I have a logical way of thinking is what makes me good at logic puzzles. This has also helped me very much in everyday life since I am an engineer.

[Pushkin]

I do like the Sudoko puzzles in the Times supplement. I can just about manage the difficult puzzles and rarely the fiendish ones.

[Flutterby]

I usually pick up the books at the grocery store and go through them fairly fast. I do end up jotting notes in the margins sometimes, and the harder ones I work at until I get stuck then skip on to the next one.

Been awhile since I bought one though.. I think I have a half finished book around here somewhere.. Thanks for reminding me!

[Elysian]

I love them too. I think my favorites are the PennyPress ones, which I get at my grocery store. They have funny questions. I think they helped me out a lot on the LSAT. Of course I usually diagram them -- can't do them cold yet, probably will never. I usually give up about halfway through the book, and start another one.

[MadderMitch]

I don't like puzzles coz they involve thinking.

[Linty Fresh]

I do like the Sudoko puzzles in the Times supplement. I can just about manage the difficult puzzles and rarely the fiendish ones.

I've heard about these, but never done them, though a friend at work swears by them. Those'll probably be my next favorite time-waster.

For those of you who can do them cold, how do you do it? Do you just look at the sentences and feel the pieces click into place in your mind, or do you have to jot one or two things down?

[Lakai]

Where do you find these puzzles? I've looked at places where they sell magazines but could not find them there. Where else could they be?

[Flutterby]

I buy them at the grocery store, they're usually in the magazine section with other puzzles. Or I get them at the bookstore, the drugstore or those magazine shops in the downtown core..

These are just the Pennypress ones. I know you can buy logic problem books at the bookstore.. not with the diagrams or squares, but ones you do cold. I can't do those ones unless I make myself a diagram though.

[Little Nemo]

I never actually constructed one, but I once invented a variation on the traditional logic puzzle. In my puzzle, you wouldn't just be given straight forward clues; they'd by trivia questions with clues based on the answers. For example, you'd get a clue like: If Andrew Johnson was elected Vice President in 1860 then the guy who lives in the green house has the pet snake. But if he wasn't, then Mr Smith's pet is named Jack.

[Fern Forest]

I'd like 'em a lot more if I didn't have two magazines' worth to edit in the next three weeks.

**grumble grumble grumble**
Really? How cool. You get two cool points. I suppose they use computers to make them now. With a program like that I'd be sorely tempted to make naughty versions for my own personal enjoyment. Right now I'm seeing one titled "The Aristocrats."


I like them but really my favorite puzzles are the ones where I have to juggle out many strains of possibilities to see which ones fail and hopefully get me down to one. So Cross Sums are the ones I love the most. Using the name they have in Dell Magazine. Sometimes I'll have 9 different possibilities going on. Although usually that just means I should give up there and move to another part of the grid. And Crossmath! Man, then it's a race to see if I can solve the puzzle before I erase through the page. Dell doesn't use the best paper.

I do like the Sudoko puzzles in the Times supplement. I can just about manage the difficult puzzles and rarely the fiendish ones.
Those seem to be making it big lately. It's always odd reading about something I like hitting it big. It just seems so unnatural. I burn out on them real fast though. Funny how quickly things can go from being fun to being tedious. I'm in the middle of a 3 month breather from the March 05 16x16 Letter-Number Place Challenger From Dell. Actually that applies to all logic puzzles.

Ooh, I was wrong. GAMES Magazine's Paint by Numbers is the best. Although you need really good eyesight to count all those boxes. I had to erase this 45x55 one from May 4 times before I got it. Not only can they be maddeningly tough but they have more personality then any other puzzle. Those I will always finish and right away too.

[Fern Forest]

Where do you find these puzzles? I've looked at places where they sell magazines but could not find them there. Where else could they be?
They come scattered in the normal Dell and Penny Press magazines. Occasionally they'll have a special edition out which will have many more then normal.

Or better still you can probably find them in the Games and Puzzles section of a book store like a Borders or Barnes & Noble.

And best of all is to just subscribe to a special logic version from one of the two main companies. Dell (http://www.dellmagazines.com/order/math.shtml) or Penny Press (http://www.pennypress.com/order/logic.shtml). Maybe others do it too, I don't know.

[uglybeech]

I've been a fan since I was a kid. I used to like the grids, but now I like the freehand ones where you just fill in the table (I don't know what you call these). I also like the Sudoko puzzles (I didn't know that's what they were called until recently).

If anyone's interested there's a guy who develops shareware graphical logic puzzles (http://www.kaser.com/). They're a little different than the grid puzzles, and it took me a little time to figure out how to play them, but I'm addicted now.

[Fern Forest]

I also like the Sudoko puzzles (I didn't know that's what they were called until recently).
Ahh, but she'll always be Number Place (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sudoko) to me.

BTW, apparantly Dell and Penny Press are owned by the same company. No wonder they seem so similar.

[twickster]

And Dell-Penny-Press isn't even the big company in the biz.

BTW, two other titles to look for: Official's Logic Problems and Original Logic and Math Problems, by the big company. Ahem.

Fern Forest -- No, the story problems aren't written by computer, they're all written by human beings. Thus the challenge in editing them -- human error, what fun.

[Fern Forest]

And Dell-Penny-Press isn't even the big company in the biz.

BTW, two other titles to look for: Official's Logic Problems and Original Logic and Math Problems, by the big company. Ahem.

Fern Forest -- No, the story problems aren't written by computer, they're all written by human beings. Thus the challenge in editing them -- human error, what fun.
Really!?

Seems like it wouldn't be too difficult to write a computer program that inputs each set of characteristics into 1 of 100 or more different layouts. Actually program schmogram, I believe I could do it in Word using mail merge. Of course you'd still have the write the opening and edit the clues since they'd come out awkward.

And really!?

I just went to the neighborhood store to check out their magazine rack and found a fifty dollar bill, woohoo. They had Dell, PP and GAMES variety mags. Everyone else was just word search and crossword. Or course living out in the pacific we may not be getting what everyone else does. And probably the biggest business is in subscriptions, not off the shelf stuff.

[Dung Beetle]

I like the ones with diagrams; I don't really know how to handle the ones with tables. I used to do the logic puzzles from my husband's magazines (he only did the crosswords.) I probably haven't done one in about two years now, but tonight I ran across two half-finished books when I was looking for something else. Then I got on the SDMB and found this thread. Weird.
The only problem is, I like to do them during a chunk of quiet time when I'm not likely to be interrupted (thinking is such hard work) and how often do I get a chunk of quiet uninterrupted "me time"? Not very.

[GargoyleWB]

Really!?

Seems like it wouldn't be too difficult to write a computer program that inputs each set of characteristics into 1 of 100 or more different layouts.

I've done similar a few times while I was taking programmable logic in an EE class...just set up boolean expressions (and, or, not, nand, xor, yada yada) for the logical phrases, set up a truth table or logic map, and let the compiler crank through the tedium of reducing the expressions. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boolean_algebra)

So "Mr. Jones has a green dog on Tuesday except when he needs mustard from the grocery" turns into something like "True = (Male and Jones) and (green and not feline) and (not weekend) and not mustard" then it automagically fills in the logic states for the particular map you've set up for it.

[Pandora]

I'd like 'em a lot more if I didn't have two magazines' worth to edit in the next three weeks.

**grumble grumble grumble**

But Twickster, my life would be miserable without your magazines... In fact, I'm done with the current one, so could you release the next one early...pretty please....
:)

[twickster]

But Twickster, my life would be miserable without your magazines... In fact, I'm done with the current one, so could you release the next one early...pretty please....
:)

Buy me lunch, and I'll see what I can do... ;) (Seriously, though, long time no see and all that -- "let's do lunch" -- emial me!)

[MentalGuy]

Ooh, I was wrong. GAMES Magazine's Paint by Numbers is the best. Although you need really good eyesight to count all those boxes. I had to erase this 45x55 one from May 4 times before I got it. Not only can they be maddeningly tough but they have more personality then any other puzzle. Those I will always finish and right away too.

A link to a variety of "pixel logic puzzles (http://www.conceptispuzzles.com)" and where Games gets their "Paint by Numbers".

[NE Texan]

I love logic and math puzzles - all of those number ones are good. I like the logic problems with some twist to them - a spatial reasoning that you have to use, for instance, or some other variation that means you can't just put them down on a grid and start marking X's.

One of my favorites is the number puzzle (NOT sudoku) where it looks like a crossword, but the digits have to add up to the numbers in the clues, but you can't repeat a digit in any answer.

I usually pick up Games magazine, world of puzzles, and Logic and Math problems.

[Oy!]

If you love this kind of puzzle, do yourself a favor and spend $19.95 here:

Sherlock (http://www.kaser.com/sherwin.html)

It's just the same kind of puzzle as Einstein's fish, but they do the setup for you in advance.

[MaxTheVool]

I would have FAR more interest in even BEGINNING to solve such a puzzle if it didn't have the ridiculous prologue about how it was written by Einstein, and how Einstein made some statement about what percentage of the world's population could solve it.

Yeah, that's the kind of thing he studied. Suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuure.



Anyhow, as far as my personal preferences, I view that particular kind of logic puzzle as rather boring and mechanical symbol manipulation. Give me lateral-thinking puzzles like this one (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=323248) (albeit, clearly defined ones) any day of the week.

[MovieMogul]

I find the only time I work in any puzzle books is when I'm on an extended trip or vacation, so that's infrequent enough that I can crank through a large chunk of a Logic Puzzle edition before I'm back home.

Of course, what this means is that I've got a ton of half-finished puzzle books in the bookshelf (since, naturally, I never pack them the next time around, but wait untili I'm in the airport to buy a new one).