Thinking Skills – 6
- POSTED ON: 6 Oct, 2017
- TOTAL VIEWS: 888 Views
- POSTED BY: Chari Vijayaraghavan
- ARTICLE POINTS: 100 Points
Welcome back to the series on thinking skills! We look at a sixth one called the ‘sense of adequacy’. Sometimes when we solve problems or puzzles, we get this feeling that ‘something is wrong’! In some cases, it might very well be true. You might not have been given the complete problem (things are not adequate), or things could be deceiving!
Here’s a popular puzzle to illustrate the same. There is a triangle formed with coloured shapes. The shapes are then moved around to form another triangle of the same size (below). But suddenly you find an extra square! How is this possible?
This is difficult to figure out isn’t it? You get the feeling that you might be missing something. Quite literally. Probably it’s an optical illusion! In fact, it’s a bit of both. Let’s look at the two figures when they are superimposed on each other. Move the slider to notice the difference (around the arrow marks).
You will realize, the second figure has a slope (hypotenuse) that is slightly curved. So the area of the missing square has been distributed along the slope (hypotenuse) of the triangle. So you haven’t quite lost that square, it’s just that you thought that the line was straight. That was a tough one to figure out…see you soon!