Re: What's Under the Shells (in minimal time)

On Apr 6, 4:20 pm, Charlie-Boo <shymath...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I have a few shells and under each can be peas, each pea being red,
yellow or blue, with no more than one of each color under each shell
(so no more than 3 peas under each shell.)

I have a detector that can check any sample of shells for the
existence or not of any type of contents: red pea, any pea, red or
blue pea, etc. The cost of a check is the same for all checks.

I'm not sure I understand. You're saying you can have the detector
ask a specific question, against a specific set of shells? So I
could ask about yellow peas in shells 1 and 2. And it says
either "yes" or "no" with no further information?

Can I ask, red but not blue? Or can I only ask in the positive?


What is the minimum number of checks on the average to find out what's
under all the shells?

"Minimum checks on average" confuses me. You just mean, what's
the optimum strategy, right? Is the goal to find out exactly what is
under each shell, or something less?


Marshall

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