Electing a leader, not as easy as you think!
A group of 543 people find it very difficult to choose a leader among themselves. So, they decide to stand in a circle and call numbers from 1 to 543 serially. Every second person is to be eliminated until only one person remains, who will be elected the leader. So, all even numbered persons were eliminated in Round 1. When No,542 is eliminated, the sequence continues, where Mr.543 survives, but the next person in the circle, Mr.1 is eliminated, and so on. Who will become the leader? a.19 b.67 c.343 d.361 e. none of these
The answer is 67.
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1 solution
This is the classical Josephus (Flavius Josephus - 37AD) problem described by this ancient historian, when in ancient Rome, Roman soldiers had chased a group of Jews into a cave and were about to attack. Rather dying in the hands of the Romans, they decided to commit suicide by arranging themselves in a circle and killing every other man until the last one survives. See article in Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josephus_problem. There, you will find programs to solve the problem, and in the case here, with 543 people, the correct answer is 63, not 67.