what is the answer to the rabbit going to the river
Odds are good that you've seen this riddle on social media lately.
I rabbit saw six elephants while going to the river. Every elephant saw 2 monkeys going towards the river. Every monkey holds ane parrot in their easily. How many animals are going towards the river?
You've probably also seen the answer framed as a sort of battle betwixt math and English. 1 affair's certain—your friends all think they have the answer but no 1 completely agrees.
The "animals going to the river" riddle from a math perspective
I'll brand one thing articulate up front and I'll say it in my all-time Dr. Leonard "Basic" McCoy vocalism: "Dangit, Jim; I'm an editor, not a mathematician!"
Merely from a math perspective, the riddle is at to the lowest degree somewhat solvable.
The respond is 5.
Did you become the same answer? If you did, yous may be in the majority, at to the lowest degree unofficially. My intel shows that five seems to be the most common answer. Allow'south take a look.
One rabbit saw six elephants while going to the river.
The rabbit is going to the river. Along the style, he saw half-dozen elephants.
That ways one rabbit is going to the river. And then far, so good.
Every elephant saw two monkeys going toward the river.
Things become a scrap more complicated here. Did the six elephants each run into a different two monkeys? In that case, you'd have 12 monkeys and ane rabbit going toward the river—xiii animals, total.
But because the sentence doesn't explicitly say that each elephant saw two dissimilar monkeys, nosotros utilize the rules of implicit differentiation and infer that the elephants each saw the same two monkeys.
If you want to know more virtually explicit and implicit functions in math, Study.com has your dorsum.
Now, let'south return to the critters. We're inferring that each elephant saw the aforementioned 2 monkeys, which ways that ane rabbit and 2 monkeys are going toward the river. So far, that's iii animals total.
Every monkey holds one parrot in their easily.
Unproblematic. We inferred that ii monkeys are going toward the river. Each monkey is holding a parrot, then that's two parrots going toward the river, too.
That gives u.s.a.:
1 rabbit +
2 monkeys +
2 parrots
___________________
5 animals
Just what almost the elephants? Well, no ane said they were going toward the river, so they don't count—they're just observers.
The riddle from an English writing perspective
Aaah, at present I'm back in my element. (That was close! I almost had to attempt some serious math, and I'm sure I would've broken something in my thinks-like-an-editor encephalon.)
From an editor's perspective, this riddle is unsolvable. Permit'south accept another expect.
One rabbit saw half dozen elephants while going to the river.
The way that sentence is constructed, we tin can merely conclude that 1 rabbit is definitely going to the river.
Animate being count going to the river: 1
Every elephant saw 2 monkeys going toward the river.
Mm-hm. But here's where things get murky because we don't know whether every elephant saw the same ii monkeys. And so, there could be 2 monkeys ... or at that place could be as many equally 12 if y'all multiply twodifferent monkeys times half dozen elephants.
Animal count going to the river: 1 rabbit + 2 monkeys = 3 ... OR 1 rabbit + (upwardly to) 12 monkeys = 13, or even some variation in between.
The fashion the first two sentences are written, we might be a bit uncertain about whether the elephants are going to the river, too. If they are, that adds some other six animals to the mix.
But let'due south stay in our lane. Le'ts assume that the elephants are indeed non going to the river and that they're but observing this weird beast parade.
Every monkey holds one parrot in their hands.
Cool. Lucky monkeys. But that still leaves u.s.a. with an undetermined corporeality of animals going to the river because clarity in writing matters and that'south why technical writers go paid and so well (or non well enough, depending on who yous ask.)
Here's where we separate the people who paid attention in biological science class from the ones who napped or wrote notes to their friends. Some people claim that "parrots aren't animals," which makes this puzzle even more of a trick question. Just parrots are part of the kingdom Animalia—they're admittedly animals! Scientifically speaking, humans are animals, likewise.
The messy (and unsatisfying) concluding answer
Whether this riddle is solvable or non depends on who y'all inquire. Math people seem to think that v is a perfectly respectable answer. English language language lovers become a little more than in the weeds about the language intricacies, merely equally I did above.
No matter how yous look at information technology, though, the answer is inferred based on a lack of explicit information.
The "to" versus "toward" conundrum
Want to add a picayune more confusion into this already messy mix? In English, "to" and "toward" don't mean exactly the aforementioned thing. We know for sure that the rabbit is going to the river. (Perhaps nosotros'll have to assume an omniscient narrator, or suspend disbelief and presume that someone asked the rabbit and he verified, "Yep, indeed; I'm going to the river!")
The narrative is a lilliputian less clear where the other animals are concerned. The monkeys are going toward the river, but is the river their destination? Perhaps they're going to hang out in a tree near the river, instead. And what'southward the deal with those parrots? Maybe they're going to have some sort of river-next become-together without really going to the river at all.
Then the final reply? The riddle can't be solved with absolute certainty.
I'd embrace my natural editorial instincts and rewrite the riddle and so information technology'south clearer. (While I'1000 at information technology, I'll brand the verb tense in all of the sentences match.)
While going to the river, one rabbit saw six elephants. Every elephant saw the same two monkeys who were too going to the river. Every monkey held one parrot in their hands. How many animals were going to the river?
That's pretty unambiguous, merely now it's just an unproblematic math question without all the contend-provoking angst. And what fun is a math question if y'all tin can't argue nigh it on Facebook?
Source: https://www.quickanddirtytips.com/education/grammar/how-many-animals-river
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