Even after I admitted to a blunder in my eighth clue to the film puzzle as “Turning blue (1995; 3)” and NOT “Turning blue (1990; 3)” like it was published earlier, there have been no correct answers so far. Well, the right film is Waiting to Exhale. As for the heading: “Debut Eulogy (2017; 5)”, it’s A Death in the Gunj. The rest of the correct entries and related stuff are downstairs in this column.
But let’s say you have to take one each of 5 different types of tablets daily but you don’t like having to open and close 5 different bottles. So at the beginning of each (30-day) month you put 30 of each type of tablet into a large jar. When it’s time to take your meds, you take them out of the jar one at a time until you have (at least) one of each type. On the last day of the month you’ll draw exactly 5 tablets and they’ll all be different, but on other days you’ll generally have to draw more than 5 tablets in order to have (at least) one of each type. The question is: On the first day of each month, how many tablets, on average, must you draw from the jar in order to have (at least) one of each?
THROUGHPUT
(Meanwhile these are two people who got nine of the films right.)
(1) Some Deserts are like this too (2013:1): Frozen; (2) Jallikattu blues (1980:2): Raging Bull; (3) Definitely not East of Eden (1961:3): West Side Story; (4) Imagine if Charles and his sister had never spoken (1991:5): The Silence of the Lambs; (5) Into the heart of darkness (1979:2): Apocalypse Now; (6) When the unthinkable thunk (1997:1): Titanic; (7) Ciao (2016:1): Arrival; (8) Turning blue (1990:3): Days of Thunder; (9) If you cut yourself (2007:4): There will be blood; 10) . . . but she’s different (1998:4): There’s something about Mary. -- Abhay Prakash, abhayprakash@hotmail.com
“When the unthinkable thunk” was a hilarious clue and “Charles and sister” needed some lateral thinking. “Jallikattu Blues” would be a sitter for a Tamil Nadu guy. A vague memory of the connection between Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness and Francis Ford Coppola’s iconic Vietnam war movie Apocalypse Now helped solve that clue. -- Balagopalan Nair K, balagopalannair@gmail.com;
(The second problem was: “From the surface of Earth if you throw a small ball straight up, does it take longer to go up or come down?”)
When the ball moves up the air resistance on the ball is downwards. The gravitational pull on the ball is also downwards. So the net force is added giving higher retardation. So the time to reach the maximum height is less. But while falling the gravitational force is always downwards and as it falls the air resistance is in an upward direction reducing the net force of gravity in decreasing the acceleration of the falling. Thus the ball will take longer. -- Nrusingha Behera, ncb123.age@gmail.com
When the ball is on its way up, both gravity and drag are acting in the same direction -- vertically downwards -- opposing its upward movement, thus reducing the time the ball spends travelling upwards. When the ball is coming down, the drag is acting upwards, which increases the time it spends travelling downwards. As a result, the ball takes longer to come down. -- K Narayana Murty, k_n_murty@yahoo.com
When the ball is thrown up, both gravity and air friction work against the upward motion. When coming down gravity aids the motion. Hence the ball returns at a shorter time. -- Sambasivam S V, svssivam@yahoo.com
(The first part of the third one was about black & white birds on a wire in two cases of different configurations and contexts.)
In the first case when birds are separated by 4 as well as 7 are to be of same colour the maximum no. of birds is 11. The order is B, W, B, B, W, B, W, B, B, W, B. In the second case of 5 in place of 4, the number can be infinite because the birds will be in alternate colours, a repetitive sequence. -- Raghavendra Rao Hebbani, rao.raghavendrah@gmail.com
BUT GOOGLE THIS NOW
1. You’re rowing a boat on a small lake and throw the anchor overboard. Does the water level of the lake rise, fall or stay the same?
2. Now a serious one. Can a bat commit suicide by tying its neck to the floor and having its legs suddenly pulled by a large helium balloon? (Only serious answers allowed.)
Sharma is a scriptwriter and former editor of Science Today magazine.(mukul.mindsport@gmail.com)