Weird fathers
One day, five eccentric fathers who are close friends--Adam, Barry, Garry, Harry, and Terry--accidentally bump into one another in a restaurant. They each announce to the rest that they are proud of raising a son. However, when they are asked to give out the name of their son, all of them refuse.
The only two pieces of information these five fathers have are as follows:
- They all know that no father has the same first initial as his son.
- Based on some cryptic conversations they had earlier, they know the names of the five sons are Aaron, Bob, Garrett, Hunter, and Thomas.
Then the following conversation takes place:
Barry: "Alright, we all probably figured this out already, but none of us can determine everyone's son's name. So let me give you guys another information: my son's name is not Hunter."
Harry: "Well, that's not helpful at all, because everyone knows my son's name can't be Hunter. Let me give you guys this tip: my son's name is not Aaron."
Adam: "This is ridiculous. At this point, we still don't know exactly who is whose son. So let me tell you guys this directly: my son's name is Bob."
Then unbeknownst to us, someone interjects, "Finally, I know the son's name of everybody."
If everyone is perfectly logical and speaks the truth, other than Adam's son's name, whose son's name are we able to figure out?
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1 solution
Let's say the fathers' names are ABGHT and their sons abght. The facts given are B-h and H-a are both not related. Then when A admit that A-b is true, what's remain to be deduced (which still might be true) are B-agt , G-aht , H-gt and T-agh. Notice that h could only be the son of G or T, so it was one of these 2 who had made the claim of knowing which boy belong to whom, as their own son's name is not h. If it was G who knows, then the solution is Ba Gt Hg and Th (plus Ab of course). If it was T who knows, then the solution is Ba Gh Ht and Tg. In both cases, Ba relation is constant.