solve this puzzle?

Question

In a city, there are P saints and K killers. Imagine yourself visiting the city.

If two saints meet each other nothing happens. If a saint meets a killer, the killer kills the saint. If two killers meet, they kill each other. What are the chances of your survival in the city, assuming you don't kill anybody but you can be killed if you happen to meet a killer ?

Answer 1

50% survival if i meet face-to-face with either the person who could be saint or the killer
100% cance of survival if i keep to the shadows and decide among 2 indiv who have just met across the road and introduce myself to both of of them ( 2 saints meet - nothing happens).. or refrain from meeting one of the surviving memeber ( coz it so seems that that this one has killed the other one .

good enough solution for the puzzle.. or do u want me to solve my answer tooo....?
the simple answer being (K-P)/(K+P) * 100 % of survival

Answer 2

Heheh sounds interesting... would that be....

1 out of 2??? Well, I ethier meet a saint or a killer, Since I do nothing no matter which one, either I get killed by a killer or I meet a saint.... so... 50 out of 100, but wouldn't it depend on how many there are of each??.... OORR>R>..

100% survival rate... i'm IMAGINING that I'm visting the city. I'm not really there. ;)

Answer 3

The probability of you being killed by the first person you meet is K/(P+K). The probability that the first person you meet is a saint is P/(P+K). Your chance of survival depends on how long you stay in the city and how many persons you meet. But, if there are lots of K in the city, you chance of survival is close to zero.

Answer 4

perhaps you mean, what is your probability of surviving an individual random encounter?

total population is (K + P ), assuming random distribution, your probability of encountering a saint is P/(P+K) and a killer is K/(P+K)

you will only be killed if you meet a killer. So in a single encounter your probability of dying is K/(P+K) and in N encounters: (K/(P+K)) ^ N

Your survival (not dying) probability after N encounters is

1 - (K/(P+K)) ^ N

and if K is about the same as P, your probably of surviving drops quicjly

.5 1 encounter
.25 2 encounters
.0625 3
.0039 4

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Now, what do we expect the actual populat to be like. if we started out at K = P and each encounter had 4 possible outcomes of equal probability:

K x K -> pop drops by 2 K
P x P -> no change
P x K -> pop drops by 1 P
K x P -> pop drops by 1 P

hmm.. that looks like equal expectation of death of Ps and Ks on average.

Answer 5

you are either a killer, or you're a saint. and if you dont kill anyone, then your a saint. and you have a 50:50 chance of meeting with another saint. so...50:50

but if you're just visiting and are neither...then its a 100% chance you live

Answer 6

Depends on the ratio of Killers to Saints. And it depends on how many people you meet in a day and how long you are betting you will survive.

Answer 7

What happens if more than one saint (or you and a saint) meets a killer? Does he kill you both, or do you convert him, or does he just leave?

Answer 8

This is why it pays to be observant. Stay away from people until you see them interact with others. If they kill someone, don't go near them. If they meet someone and both live, then both of those people are saints (you can hang around with them). I play it smart, and live.

If you want an actual answer, I need to know how often people meet other people each day. And a bit of time to compute it.

Answer 9

There is insufficient data to solve this question. Are you a saint? a killer? neither? What is the ratio of saints to killers?

Answer 10

if K is odd, your chances are zero - there will be one killer left with nobody to kill him, and he will get to you eventually.

if K is even, you stand a chance of all killers killing each other before they kill you. Getting Probability of that is a lengthy computation which probably boils down to a manageable formula, but doing it is not fun at all.