This question was submitted by a reader (I'm not sure if I have his permission to show his name).
Does trying to find the ONE bottle of wine that is poisoned out of many others sound familiar?
I am sending you this e-mail to propose you a QotD. I like you blog and I'd like to see how other people manage this one:
There was a king that for some reason had to throw a big party in 3 weeks and for some reason had 1000 bottles of a very good wine, many of which he wanted to use at the party. He knew that one and only one bottle of the one thousand was poisoned and that the poison killed whoever drank from that bottle in APPROXIMATELY 2 weeks. He had 10 people that were willing to risk their lives so that he could find the poisoned bottle. How did he find it?
Assumptions: if a pawn drinks from the poisoned wine today, he could die in 11 or 17 days, or whatever; a drop of wine out of the many that a pawn can drink certainly kills him if it is poisoned; there is a solution.
If you have any questions, please ask, so you can solve it, don't read the solution. So, good luck; I am looking forward to hearing from you.