Sunday, August 26, 2007

Ponder These...

…and simultaneously ponder the future of mankind.












This Week's Puzzler

Update and bump:

Simon M. writes with a question about exactly what “thread count” actually means. There are two ways one could interpret that phrase: that in one square inch there are 200 threads (counting the threads going in both directions, so 100 in each direction), or that there are 200 threads per inch going one way (so 400 going both ways). I'm not sure what the correct use of that terminology is, but … for the purposes of my puzzler, I mean the second definition (200 going each way in a square inch, for 400 threads all together).

Original post:

Suppose you have a bed sheet that is exactly 6 feet wide and 8 feet long, with 200 thread count. If all the threads that comprise the sheet were laid end-to-end, how long would the resulting thread be (in miles)?

Cast your vote at right…