Akbar and Birbal used to play chess almost every evening..... One evening Akbar was extremely pleased with Birbal's game and offered him a grand reward. "Ask and thou shalt receive. I am rich enough to satisfy thy most cherised wish," said Akbar.Birbal was hesitant but on being forced by the Emperor said, "Sir, I would like to have one grain of wheat for the first square on the chess board, two for the second, four for the third and so on for all the 64 squares.""Is that all?" retorted Akbar. "Birbal thy request is not worthy of my generosity. Any way thou shalt receive thy sack of grain."What do you think was the size of the sack?
This puzzle came in the logic and reasoning section of the IIT interviews.
One of my very good friends has asked me this question..... i need help....
2006-10-06 17:22:49 · 13 answers · asked by aksha 1 in Education & Reference ➔ Trivia
Like PJ said, the total number of grains would be 2^64 - 1 = 18,446,744,073,709,551,615.
But there's no sack in the world that would hold that amount of wheat. I read in a chess book where a similar story was told that to produce that amount of wheat it would be necessary to plant ALL of Earth's continents 77 times !!!
2006-10-06 18:27:08 · answer #1 · answered by LeAd DiAg 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Actually, the EXACT answer is 2^64 - 1.
1 square = 1 grain = 2^1 - 1
2 squares = 1+2 grains = 3 = 2^2-1
3 squares = 1+2+4 grains = 7 = 2^3 - 1
4 squares = 1+2+4+8 grains = 15 = 2^4 - 1
5 squares = 1+2+4+8+16 = 31 = 2^5 - 1
...
64 squares = 1+2+4+...+2^63 = 2^64 - 1
This comes out to 18446744073709551615 grains.
2006-10-06 17:57:26 · answer #2 · answered by PJ 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
You have the answers already. It is a very smart question. But I really do not think that request was made by birbal. It was some Indian who invented the game of chess.
2006-10-06 19:53:49 · answer #3 · answered by Hardrock 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
it's exponential. If he's doubling the amount of rice every square, towards the end he will have to give roughly a grainery full of wheat per square. on the last square alone he'd be getting like 2^63 grains of wheat, which is rediculous.
2006-10-06 17:28:46 · answer #4 · answered by smoothsteve 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Well u already got the answer from some of the people,, the sack must be big enough to hold 18446744073709551616 no of grain.. thank you
2006-10-06 17:39:10 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
That, is an unanswerable riddle. That is also the word that is used in the English language for several grammatical purposes: to introduce a restrictive clause as a demonstrative pronoun as a complementiser. and the punctuation following it is a full stop or a period.
2016-03-28 00:32:30 · answer #6 · answered by ? 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I can't remember the exact formula but it will probably a 20 or 30 digit number.
2006-10-06 17:32:21 · answer #7 · answered by steve g 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Big enough to hold the grain.
2006-10-06 17:28:16 · answer #8 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
It was all the wheat in the kingdom - so it was a huge sack.
2006-10-06 18:29:12 · answer #9 · answered by ravenwood4455 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
It woulb be like a 20 pound bag.
2006-10-06 17:32:10 · answer #10 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋