they’re critical thinking? I guess I better go back and read my text book
1-I hate watching tennis-I’d much rather play
2-The number changes daily or even hourly-but not that fast if they are being imported
3-grocery stores? Calories are in the food they sell. The amount varies greatly otherwise with incoming and outgoing numbers
4-Very carefully?
5-How lonely? How many items? Any electric there? Any running water, anything at all?
6-Depends on which version of Batman you are talking about
7-Got any paper to write on so I can figure it out?
8-Mighty Mouse, because he is just SOOO cool!
9-there are so many things, I was very wild when I was young and then what is your definition of wild?
10-sad that it created a monster called “found footage movies” horrible horrible genre. Fake. At least they tried…they can stick those and reality shows where the sun dont shine! :smack:
How many tennis balls are used during the course of Wimbledon?
one
Estimate the total number of cars in the UK.
500000
How many calories in a grocery store?
billion
How would you sell a fridge to an Eskimo?
tell him his ice cream will melt
What would you take with you to a lonely island and why?
weed seeds, duh
Is Batman a superhero?
who is Batman?
You have 17 red and 17 blue balls, and you remove two at a time. If the two are the same colour, add in one extra blue ball. If they are different colours, add in one extra red ball. What colour is the final ball removed?
blue
What cartoon character would you be and why?
goth kids
What is the wildest thing that you have ever done?
gave ass to mouth and went butt naked in public
What was your opinion of the film Blair Witch Project?
i watched it on shrooms, scary movie
How many tennis balls are used during the course of Wimbledon?
I don’t follow tennis so I have no idea how many games or sets are typical so I can’t really say, but they probably change the balls pretty regularly, maybe once per set or even once per game.
Estimate the total number of cars in the UK.
What’s the population of the UK, a few million? Maybe theres’s one car for every half dozen residents or so. So maybe a few hundred thousand?
How many calories in a grocery store?
The question is too vague. Are we talking a corner grocery store or a Wegman’s?
How would you sell a fridge to an Eskimo?
I’m pretty sure that modern Inuits live in heated houses like anyone else, so I sell to them the same way I’d sell to anyone else.
What would you take with you to a lonely island and why?
A means of leaving the island. The why should be obvious.
Is Batman a superhero?
He doesn’t have any super powers, does he, so if we want to be literal then no. However, I think he’s been sort of grandfathered into the category because he’s been considered one since very early in the life of the concept.
You have 17 red and 17 blue balls, and you remove two at a time. If the two are the same colour, add in one extra blue ball. If they are different colours, add in one extra red ball. What colour is the final ball removed?
My first guess would by 50/50 red/blue, but I ran some simulations of this and I always end up with a red ball. There may be a problem with my simulation, but I’m thinking that there’s a mathematical reason for this. I have to think about it.
What cartoon character would you be and why?
Quagmire on family guy. He’s a happy go lucky guy and constantly gets laid with no real permanent consequences.
What is the wildest thing that you have ever done?
Parasailing.
What was your opinion of the film Blair Witch Project?
At the time it was a clever idea for making an interesting film inexpensively and with no real film-making talent. Bad production and bad photography were features rather than bugs. That said, it’s the kind of thing that someone can only do once. After that it’s just repetitive.
Refrigerators don’t contain heaters and aren’t perfectly insulated. If the ambient temp is below the set temp, there’s nothing to prevent them from freezing food solid inside.
As to the rest, I’m self employed and don’t cask myself dumb questions.
This reminds me of an interview question I was asked once that was so pointless and difficult that I’ve never forgotten it.
Q. Describe what it would be like to be inside a ping pong ball.
A part of me says “yup, I get it, you want to see if I can extemporize and think on my feet.” But another part of me says “I will never have to do either of those activities in the job I’m applying for.”
I gave them a long, rambling answer, about translucent light and the absence of external stimuli, coupled with how stale the air was and how I was getting giddy from the absence of oxygen.
Or, to put it in non-programming terms - the colors are irrelevant, what you are doing each iteration is taking out 2 and adding back 1, for a net change of -1. Starting with 34 and decrementing the total by 1 each time, eventually you will get down to 2. When you take out those 2 but put one back there is only one left in the bucket and you can no longer take 2. Game over.
I’m surprised that all of you have been tricked by this question.
They fool you by making it a grocery store and making you think of food. (Trivia: the “calories” on the food label are actually “kilocalories” or “large calories” and not actual calories.) A calorie is actually a measure of energy, specifically the amount of energy needed to raise the temperature of one gram of water by one degree Celcius.
So, to determine the number of calories in a grocery store (or any other kind of store for that matter), you would need to set a beaker of water on the roof of the store and then set it (the store, not the beaker) on fire and see how the temperature of the water changes (subtracting the energy supplied by the fire accelerant, if you used one).
How many tennis balls are used during the course of Wimbledon? They use fresh balls each serve, lest someone complain about a scruffed or damaged ball in play. About 40 per set, maybe a couple hundred each day of play.
Estimate the total number of cars in the UK. Real cars or those little tins that are driven in the EU? 32.5 million in the UK.
How many calories in a grocery store? None. Calories are a real, defined measure of work. All that food in the store is potential calories. Once we eat them we put the calories into the work system.
How would you sell a fridge to an Eskimo? As a way to keep Summer flies off of the food.
What would you take with you to a lonely island and why? A woman that I do not like. It will inspire me to get off the fucking island.
Is Batman a superhero? No. He has no power beyond the technology he has developed. He is just a guy with money to make toys. Like Elon Musk.
You have 17 red and 17 blue balls, and you remove two at a time. If the two are the same colour, add in one extra blue ball. If they are different colours, add in one extra red ball. What colour is the final ball removed? It is blue. It is intuitive. You show me your work that shows it is not blue.
What cartoon character would you be and why? I would be Bugs Bunny because I am an eternally positive person, and a bit of a smart ass.
**What is the wildest thing that you have ever done? **I’ve been to a city, once.
What was your opinion of the film Blair Witch Project? It worked for its time. People made money off it. Are you going to give me money too?
And then the rest is history. I would like a corner office.
The water would evaporate long before all of the energy in the store had been released.
Of course, in actuality, all of the energy in the store would never be released. That would require nuclear reactions.
But, ignoring all that, and going with your idea, my answer was “The question is too vague. Are we talking a corner grocery store or a Wegman’s?”. That answer still stands as the answer still depends on the size of the store.
Was this interview with Microsoft? My son used to interview applicants and that was one of the questions he used frequently (as did others–the interviews were ordinary developers, not HR types). The point of the question was to find out how you would go about answering such a question, not finding the right answer. Here was a typical “correct” answer: “Well, my home town (or my neighborhood if you are from a large city) of 20,000 has four gas stations. So maybe one station for every 5000 people. So 300,000,000 might have 60,000 stations.” The answer might be far off, but it is your approach that they are looking for. And while googling will answer that question, a developer is likely to face questions google cannot answer.
Some of the others seem abysmally stupid, I grant, but #7, while badly worded, is a nice logic puzzle. It should have asked, “When there is only one ball left, what color is it?” And answer is indeed red, as shown above.
How many tennis balls are used during the course of Wimbledon?
About 325,000,000 tennis balls are manufactured each year. Allowing an average life of 50 weeks per ball approximately 4% or 13,000,000 would be used during Wimbledon fortnight. Of course only a tiny fraction of 1% of these balls are actually used **at **Wimbledon.
I was once asked how many cars on the expressway during rush hour; state how you got your answer. As others have said, he wasn’t looking for a bottom line # as much as the thought process.
My answer: I estimate it to be 5 miles long, a truck is 50’ & a car is 10’ (round #s are easier for mental math). There are more cars than trucks; therefore the average vehicle length is 20’. Because it’s rush hour & traffic is going slow there’s only one car length between vehicles so each vehicle occupies 40’ & 5 miles is 26,000’ = 650 vehicles.
I passed the question…& got the job!
Rough thought process - 4 balls in play, changed every 7 games - about 9 games per set on average - about 3-4 sets per match (averaging men and women), 254 matches - so about 4-5,000.
Half the population - so about 30 million.
As said - too vague.
Depends. Where does he live? Just because he’s an eskimo, doesn’t mean he’s still living at the North Pole. Either that, or wait in my fridge shop. When an Eskimo comes in wanting a fridge, I will sell him one - politely and professionally.
Return Ticket.
No, Batman is a fictional character.
Red. That’s the last remaining color. Whether that can be removed or not depends upon how you enforce the ‘rules’ of the game.
I have never thought about this. I don’t want to be a cartoon.
That’s personal information that I may share with my close friends and family.
It sounds like a cleverly-marketed film that made a lot of money. I’ve never seen it.
How many tennis balls are used during the course of Wimbledon?
Enough to fill Cannes.
Estimate the total number of cars in the UK.
X= ((65 million *4)/10) * .85
*The 15% are Jags and Boras that off road awaiting repairs. Aka “wishful thinking” cars.
Your turn: Y?
How many calories in a grocery store?
Honestly, I’ve never burned one down. I’m sure there would be lots. If you’ll stay and measure, I’ll toss on a match. Wanna…? Are you sure…?
How would you sell a fridge to an Eskimo?
On-line, with free shipping, and with a code for perpetual free “Amazon Prime”.
What would you take with you to a lonely island and why?
A beautiful woman, a gigantic french-oak vat filled with red wine, 2 months of food, and a gallon of edible lube*.
(Some women experience constipation after a steady diet of red wine. Why, what were you thinking…?)
Is Batman a superhero?
Perhaps, but remember: Not All Rich Assholes are superheroes (and Absolutely None of them are Batman).
You have 17 red and 17 blue balls, and you remove two at a time. If the two are the same colour, add in one extra blue ball. If they are different colours, add in one extra red ball. What colour is the final ball removed?
Red, dripping, and the voice of the person who asked me would then be Falsetto.
What cartoon character would you be and why?
None of them. I wouldn’t be a tat on sexy flesh; why would I want to be ink on cheap paper?
What is the wildest thing that you have ever done?
I once came This Close to answering this question on a public message board.
What was your opinion of the film Blair Witch Project?
That’s cool, but my answer is “blue,” based on this reasoning: when there’s one ball left, there’s no more removal of balls, given the puzzle’s rules. So the last removal is of two balls. Since the puzzle asks me to determine the color of the last ball, they must both be the same color. Since there can’t be an even number of red balls, they can’t both be red. Therefore they must both be blue.
