Re: Riddles (was: Lateral Thinking)

From: Eliezer S. Yudkowsky (sentience@pobox.com)
Date: Fri Jan 05 2001 - 21:15:12 MST


Damien Broderick wrote:
>
> 3. < How do I open each box, and complete the task? > Task, what task? You
> haven't mentioned any task. But I dare say Eliezer will patiently explain
> to me that in the traditional riddle form, the task is to solve the riddle. :)

No, in the traditional riddle form, 'the task' refers to the solution of
that nontrivial problem which is suggested by the affordances of whichever
objects are mentioned in the riddle. In this case, opening each box.
Jeepers.

-- -- -- -- --
Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/
Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence



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