Hey, everbody. How’s it going?

Hoje tem um lateral thinking puzzle or problem. É um probleminha que requer pensamento criativo e original para ser resolvido. Por que a pessoa da historinha tem esse comportamento? Não vale postar a resposta aqui! (semana que vem eu posto).

Transcrição

Hi, everybody! What’s up? Today we have a new episode of the inglesonline podcast. To download or just listen to other episodes and download transcripts, go to inglesonline.com.br and click Podcast Inglesonline.

Today on our podcast I’m gonna talk about lateral thinking. What does that mean? Well, the Wikipedia… you know Wikipedia? Wikipedia.org. The Wikipedia says that lateral thinking is when you solve a problem using an indirect and creative approach. That means that the solution isn’t obvious and that you won’t find the solution through traditional logic. In other words, to use a popular expression, you have to think outside of the box to solve lateral thinking problems. To think outside of the box means to think creatively, to be original or unusual, stuff like that.

So there are many lateral thinking puzzles, or problems available on the Internet and for this episode I’ve selected one that is probably the most well-known lateral thinking problem of all. So, before I present it to you, let me establish a few ground rules: you can easily find the solution to this puzzle by googling it. That means, doing a Google search. You can do that if you want, or maybe you’ve heard of this problem before and you know the solution. Whatever the case, please do not post the answer in the comments.

Deal? OK, here’s the puzzle:

A man lives on the twelfth floor of an apartment building. Every morning he takes the elevator down to the lobby and leaves the building. In the evening, he gets into the elevator, and, if there is someone else in the elevator — or if it was raining that day — he goes back to his floor directly. Otherwise, he goes to the tenth floor and walks up two flights of stairs to his apartment.

So, what do you think? Are you familiar with the puzzle? Let’s break it down: a man lives on the twelfth floor of an apartment building. That’s floor #12, right? Tenth, eleventh, twelfth… So he lives on the twelfth floor. I live on the fifth floor, by the way. Which floor do you live on? So, moving right along… This guy takes the elevator every morning, down to the lobby, and then leaves the building. He probably goes to work every day, or maybe he goes to school, we don’t know.

Anyway, in the evening he gets into the elevator… but here’s the interesting part: if there is someone else in the elevator when he gets in, or if it was raining that day… he goes to his floor directly. Now, if there’s no one in the elevator when he gets in,  or if it didn’t rain that day, then he goes to the tenth floor, floor #10. And he gets out of the elevator on the tenth floor. Not on the twelfth floor, where he lives. If there’s no one in the elevator, or if it didn’t rain, he takes the elevator up to the tenth floor, gets out, and walks up two flights of stairs to his apartment on the twelfth floor.

Now, why does he do that? When he gets back home, in the evening, he’ll go directly to the twelfth floor if there’s someone else in the elevator, or if it rained that day. Otherwise, he gets out on the tenth, and climbs two flights of stairts to the twelfth. Can you imagine why someone would do that?

So leave us your comments, tell us what you think. And I’ll give you guys the answer probably later this week or on the next podcast. Talk to you next time.

 

Glossary

deal? = combinado?

whatever the case = qualquer que seja o caso

moving right along = continuando