Tag Archives: Test your intuition

Test your intuition 47: AGC-GTC-TGC-GTC-TGC-GAC-GATC-? what comes next in the sequence?

Posted on December 24, 2021 by Gil Kalai

Before getting to the main topic of this post, first, Happy New Year 2022 and Merry Christmas to all readers, and second, a quick update: A community blog to discuss open problems in algebraic combinatorics was created. Everybody is invited … Continue reading →

Posted in Algebra, Combinatorics, Geometry, Test your intuition | Tagged , | 1 Comment

Test Your Intuition (46): What is the Reason for Maine’s Huge Influence?

Posted on October 26, 2020 by Gil Kalai

Very quick updates: Corona: Israel is struggling with the pandemic with some successes,  some failures, and much debate. Peace: We have peace agreements now with several Arab countries, most recently with Sudan. This is quite stunning. Internal politics: As divided … Continue reading →

Posted in Games, Probability, Statistics, Test your intuition | Tagged , | 6 Comments

Cheerful Test Your Intuition (#45): Survey About Sisters and Brothers

Posted on October 2, 2020 by Gil Kalai

You survey many many school children and ask each one: Do you have more brothers than sisters? or more sisters than brothers? or the same number? Then you separate the boys’s answers from the girls’s answers Which of the following … Continue reading →

Posted in Combinatorics, Probability, Riddles, Statistics, Test your intuition | Tagged | 7 Comments

TYI44: “What Then, To Raise an Old Question, is Mathematics?”

Posted on March 26, 2020 by Gil Kalai

“The argument is carried out not in mathematical symbols but in ordinary English, there is no obscure or technical terms. Knowledge of calculus is not presupposed. In fact, one hardly need to know how to count. Yet any mathematician will … Continue reading →

Posted in Test your intuition, What is Mathematics | Tagged , | 14 Comments

Test your intuition 43: Distribution According to Areas in Top Departments.

Posted on January 24, 2020 by Gil Kalai

  In the community of mamathetitians in a certain country there are mamathetitians in two areas: Anabra (fraction p of the mamathetitians) and Algasis (fraction 1-p of  mamathetitians.) There are ten universities with 50 faculty members in each mamathetics department … Continue reading →

Posted in Combinatorics, Open problems, Probability, Test your intuition | Tagged | 9 Comments

Test Your Intuition 42: How Much do you Gain by Knowing The Game You Play?

Posted on December 16, 2019 by Gil Kalai

There are two players  – the row player and the column player and there are two possible zero-sum games described in the picture below. For each of these games the row players has two strategies T (top) and Bottom (B) … Continue reading →

Posted in Games, Test your intuition | Tagged , , , | 6 Comments

TYI 41: How many steps does it take for a simple random walk on the discrete cube to reach the uniform distribution?

Posted on December 2, 2019 by Gil Kalai

Aeiel Yadin’s homepage contains great lecture notes on harmonic functions on groups and on various other topics. I have a lot of things to discuss and to report; exciting developments in the analysis of Boolean functions; much to report on … Continue reading →

Posted in Combinatorics, Probability, Test your intuition | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Test Your Intuition 40: What Are We Celebrating on Sept, 28, 2019? (And answer to TYI39.)

Posted on September 28, 2019 by Gil Kalai

Update: We are celebrating 10 years anniversary to Mathoverflow Domotorp got the answer right. congratulations, Domotorp! To all our readers: Shana Tova Umetuka –  שנה טובה ומתוקה – Happy and sweet (Jewish) new year.

Posted in Test your intuition, What is Mathematics | Tagged , | 6 Comments

TYI 39 : Can a coalition of children guarantees all being in the same class?

Posted on July 25, 2019 by Gil Kalai

There is a class of children that have just finished elementary school. Now they all move from elementary school to high school and classes are reshuffled. Each child lists three friends, and the assignment of children into classes ensures that … Continue reading →

Posted in Combinatorics, Economics, Mathematics to the rescue, Test your intuition | Tagged | 3 Comments

Test Your Intuition (or simply guess) 37: Arithmetic Progressions for Brownian Motion in Space

Posted on March 7, 2019 by Gil Kalai

  Consider a Brownian motion in three dimensional space. What is the largest number of points on the path described by the motion which form an arithmetic progression? (Namely, , so that all are equal.)   A 2-D picture; In … Continue reading →

Posted in Probability, Test your intuition | Tagged , | 8 Comments