Riddler - Solutions to "Pick A Number, Any Number": low_numbers.csv
Data license: CC Attribution 4.0 License · Data source: fivethirtyeight/data on GitHub · About: simonw/fivethirtyeight-datasette
3,660 rows sorted by Show Your Work
This data as json, copyable, CSV (advanced)
Link | rowid | Your Number | Show Your Work ▼ |
---|---|---|---|
340 | 340 | 5 | |
518 | 518 | 9 | |
841 | 841 | 16 | |
854 | 854 | 17 | |
1240 | 1240 | 25 | |
1771 | 1771 | 41 | |
3314 | 3314 | 351 | |
3337 | 3337 | 403 | |
3449 | 3449 | 721 | |
3116 | 3116 | 193 | Assuming 1500 entries, assuming a Zipf distribution, the number choosing 1 would be 1500/7.89 ~ 190. The Zipf distribution is: n, n/2, n/3, n/4, n/5, n/6, ... (i.e the harmonic series). The 7.89 is the sum of the harmonic series out to 1500. So the expected value of the number choosing a particular interger drops to 1 at about 190. So the lowest unused number is probably around there. If we think of this as an n person zero sum game, then it depends on whether n is even or odd. If n is odd (= 2*k + ), then any alliance of k + 1 players can force a win by choosing all the numbers from 1 to k + 1. At least 1 of them must be unique. If n is even (= 2*k), then any alliance of k players can force a tie by choosing all the numbers from 1 to k. At least 1 of them must be unique, unless the other k players also choose all the numbers from 1 to k. |
3029 | 3029 | 164 | say my name |
3190 | 3190 | 229 | None really |
350 | 350 | 5 | . |
2425 | 2425 | 77 | Hide 68, 34, 17, 85, 5, 95, 19, 38, 76, 4, 92, 46, 23, 69, 3, 87, 29, 58, 2, 62, 31, 93, 1, 39, 78, 26, 52, 13, 91, 7, 77, 11, 99, 33, 66, 22, 44, 88, 8, 56, 28, 84, 42, 21, 63, 9, 81, 27, 54, 18, 90, 45, 15, 75, 25, 50, 100, 20, 40, 80, 16, 64, 32, 96, 6, 36, 72, 24, 48, 12, 60, 30, 10, 70, 14, 98, 49 I am pretty sure there is a way to get to 78, but I can't figure it out. I looked at the primes first, saw where I could input them in my set, then I looked at numbers with only two multiples and thought of where they would have to go. From there it was a lot of trial and error. |
2756 | 2756 | 117 | A guess? |
2456 | 2456 | 81 | Best guess |
3120 | 3120 | 194 | Don't try to quantify my art, man! |
2270 | 2270 | 67 | I asked my daughter at dinner tonight, she said it was the best year for muscle cars. That sounded better than my original choice of 2 for people who initially thought 1 but then on second thought went higher and passed 2. |
836 | 836 | 16 | People wanted an interesting sounding number or a prime number or something like 167 that feels unique. I predict they shy away from numbers with lots of divisors. Also people will be afraid a very low numbers. |
2074 | 2074 | 54 | X |
2758 | 2758 | 117 | aribitrary chosen |
2051 | 2051 | 53 | x <-abs(rnorm(1))*500 |
1510 | 1510 | 34 | ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ |
2269 | 2269 | 67 | ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ |
3178 | 3178 | 221 | ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ |
676 | 676 | 13 | "I'm not superstitious, but I'm a little stitious" |
2876 | 2876 | 131 | "show your work" this aint a math problem, you sound like my teacher 131 is good enough |
567 | 567 | 10 | "ten is a stupid number to pick, pick a weird number that nobody else will" |
3623 | 3623 | 17322 | $echo $RANDOM |
2049 | 2049 | 53 | 'Twas my basketball number at St. Norbert College |
3626 | 3626 | 22908 | (2*3*23+2+3+23)*2*3*23 |
3624 | 3624 | 19683 | (3^3)^3 |
734 | 734 | 14 | *shrug* |
1036 | 1036 | 20 | *shrug* |
1200 | 1200 | 24 | *shrug* |
1963 | 1963 | 47 | *shrug* |
417 | 417 | 7 | *shrugs* |
259 | 259 | 3 | - |
608 | 608 | 11 | - |
1162 | 1162 | 23 | - |
1173 | 1173 | 23 | - |
1248 | 1248 | 26 | - |
848 | 848 | 17 | -- |
802 | 802 | 15 | . |
996 | 996 | 19 | . |
1477 | 1477 | 32 | . |
1686 | 1686 | 38 | . |
3247 | 3247 | 267 | . |
3291 | 3291 | 317 | . |
444 | 444 | 8 | ... |
1766 | 1766 | 40 | ... |
3140 | 3140 | 206 | ... |
3245 | 3245 | 266 | ... |
2981 | 2981 | 151 | ...Lucky guess? |
460 | 460 | 8 | 0 - 7 might be non-unique.. |
10 | 10 | 0 | 0 is the lowest positive integer number. People will probably try to avoid numbers they think everyone will pick, might as well pick the lowest. |
6 | 6 | 0 | 0 is the lowest possible integer that is not negative. |
3255 | 3255 | 273 | 0-99 will be someones favorite player's jersey number. 100-199 will be suffer from the same problem but with the person adding 100 to it to beat everyone else. So the first number will be in the 200's. 273 is not prime, not a square, not a cube, etc. The most distinct thing about it is that its the triple point of water in Kelvin and might be some 14 year old's birthday. |
686 | 686 | 13 | 1 + 3 = 13 |
118 | 118 | 1 | 1 is a terrible pick, but everyone knows that and might avoid it. |
138 | 138 | 1 | 1 is a unique number -- there is no other number like it! |
81 | 81 | 1 | 1 is an integer |
1212 | 1212 | 24 | 1 is going to be trolled. I expect prime numbers to be heavily submitted. So a prime plus 1 doesn't seem too daft. |
147 | 147 | 1 | 1 is really low |
97 | 97 | 1 | 1 is the lowest positive integer. Since it needs to be the lowest unique integer, I'm assuming that everyone will consider 1 to be too obvious a choice and hence unlikely to be unique. Much like my strategy would be on The Price Is Right, I'll bet $1, Bob. |
261 | 261 | 3 | 1 is the obvious answer if there were only one submission... but I assume the website has more readers than just myself. Again, assuming most people will realize similarly and pick >30 again assuming the lower numbers have already been chosen by others... But what happens when everyone thinks the same thing and skips the numbers under 10. Okay, it's not 3 but I'm not a game theory expert. |
124 | 124 | 1 | 1 is the smallest positive integer |
2282 | 2282 | 68 | 1 less than the children who will choose 69 :-) |
283 | 283 | 4 | 1 or 2 is too low. When picking a random number, I suspect most people lean towards odd numbers, so, 4 it is. Probably way too low; this one seems ripe for collusion and automated entries... |
1890 | 1890 | 44 | 1) I assume people are more likely to choose numbers they think are unique, so more likely to choose odd or prime numbers. I will choose an even number not divisible by 10. 2) Just guessing, I'd imagine that the first sqrt(n) numbers will all be taken. I am also guessing that maybe 1000 people will play, so probably the first 32 numbers will all be taken. I'm looking for an even number greater than 32. 3) Just to fudge a bit, I'll pick 44. (42 seems too cliche a pick. 38 might be a possibility.) |
128 | 128 | 1 | 1, 2, 3, 4... |
377 | 377 | 6 | 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 seem like obvious choices based on familiarity and common usage (1 is the lowest positive integer, a couple/duo/etc. for 2, lists of 3, table for 4, 5 fingers). After that, I would think most people would skip to the "lucky" number 7, leaving 6 as a, perhaps, lonely exclusion. Beyond that, I would think 8 or 9 might be reasonable choices, with response rates spiking again at 10 (our base numbering system), 13 (for being "unlucky), and then slowly declining as one moves away from the lowest number with small spikes at "round" numbers (15, 20, 25, etc.). |
1843 | 1843 | 43 | 1,2,3,...,43 |
3443 | 3443 | 689 | 1,382 readers submitted responses to the original Riddler Castle problem. As this is a simple answer to give, the response rate should be higher than 1,382, however I will assume 1,382. Assuming a non-even distribution of responses, weighted to the lower half, selecting a number which is half of the estimated responses should be a good chance of being both low and unique. To ensure that the number is unique, the number is reduced by 2. |
3444 | 3444 | 691 | 1,538 people (an appropriate number, given this website's name) submitted an answer to the coffee question. I'm presuming a similar amount submitting for this. Rather than simply putting 1500 or so, I figure there will be a decent amount of repeats and of numbers too high, so I'm ballparking a number a hair under half of the total number of submissions, then somewhat randomized; 691 is prime. |
3410 | 3410 | 566 | 1,538 people responded to who can drink the most coffee, so I assume around 1,538 people will submit answers to this riddle. I want to distribute their numbers logarithmically, with more people submitting low numbers. I chose the formula y = -ln(x/1538), with y being the number chosen and x being the number of people choosing that number. 566 is the lowest value for y with less than 1 people choosing it. |
1068 | 1068 | 21 | 1-10 are gonna get tried, 11-20 are probably gonna be filled with people too clever to pick 1-10, so i'm too clever for those. So 21! Hot damn! Look how Smart i as! SMRT! |
753 | 753 | 14 | 1-10 are obviously out. 11and 13 are primes and will get picked. I would say 12 but I feel like someone will pick it. 14 is very boring. |
631 | 631 | 12 | 1-10 has a large probability of being chosen. 11 also has a high chance. |
1055 | 1055 | 20 | 1-10 is too obvious, 11-19 are often people's favorite numbers, numbers ending in 5's or 0's are statistically less often chosen |
1130 | 1130 | 22 | 1-10 is too obvious. 11-21 is too obvious. 22 is a rare number to chose. |
3059 | 3059 | 173 | 1-100 are too obvious! |
3512 | 3512 | 1034 | 1-1000 feels like bots may get it +34 feels like a number unlikely to be picked |
987 | 987 | 19 | 1-10= too easy, 11= specious choice 12= too many Tom Brady fans, 13= unlucky, 14= maybe, but still too low. 15= avoid multiples of 5 at all costs 16= too common in everyday culture, 17= plausible, but false, 18= (see #12, but for manning), 19=juuuuuuust right |
1125 | 1125 | 22 | 1-20 Are too common. 23 is prime and likely to be chosen. 21 is blackjack. |
2048 | 2048 | 53 | 1-29 was way too popular. 30-49 was a close range but in the end I wanted 50-60 and snagged a random number, 53 |
1500 | 1500 | 33 | 1-31 all fall on days of month which could conceivably be their favorite number, 32 is going to be a popular guess because of this and so I go with next available. 33 |
450 | 450 | 8 | 1-5 will get selected and the likely hood of someone selecting 6,7,8 is probably close to the same |
2494 | 2494 | 86 | 1-50 I wasn't going to touch. When people pick random numbers they tend to pick ones with 7 - so I avoided using it. 86 felt random enough to me while still being somewhat low. |
858 | 858 | 17 | 1. 7. |
2509 | 2509 | 87 | 1000 submissions on battle for riddler nation 2 so number should be somewhere from 1-500. Many people probably pick between 1-75 so anything greater is probably a crapshoot to be unique and be the lowest number |
3499 | 3499 | 1001 | 1001 is an integer |
2605 | 2605 | 102 | 102 is fairly uncommon, and it's low enough that most numbers won't beat it. In addition, it's not like a lot of people think of 102 as a low number. |
2615 | 2615 | 103 | 103 isn't a popular number. I figure everyone else will pick numbers lower than 100 |
598 | 598 | 11 | 11 is my favorite number! |
2675 | 2675 | 110 | 110 Is thought to be a uniquely unpopular number, not sure if it is a little high for this purpose... |
2676 | 2676 | 110 | 111-1 |
3520 | 3520 | 1112 | 1111 + 1 |
3052 | 3052 | 171 | 112 |
2802 | 2802 | 121 | 11^2 |
Advanced export
JSON shape: default, array, newline-delimited
CREATE TABLE "riddler-pick-lowest/low_numbers" ( "Your Number" TEXT, "Show Your Work" TEXT );