The King and the Poison
Logic puzzles require you to think. You will have to be logical in your reasoning.
In a far away land, it was known that if you drank poison, the only way to save yourself is to drink a stronger poison, which neutralizes the weaker poison. The king that ruled the land wanted to make sure that he possessed the strongest poison in the kingdom, in order to ensure his survival, in any situation. So the king called the kingdom's pharmacist and the kingdom's treasurer, he gave each a week to make the strongest poison. Then, each would drink the other one's poison, then his own, and the one that will survive, will be the one that had the stronger poison.
The pharmacist went straight to work, but the treasurer knew he had no chance, for the pharmacist was much more experienced in this field, so instead, he made up a plan to survive and make sure the pharmacist dies. On the last day the pharmacist suddenly realized that the treasurer would know he had no chance, so he must have a plan. After a little thought, the pharmacist realized what the treasurer's plan must be, and he concocted a counter plan, to make sure he survives and the treasurer dies. When the time came, the king summoned both of them. They drank the poisons as planned, and the treasurer died, the pharmacist survived, and the king didn't get what he wanted.
What exactly happened there?
The treasurer's plan was to drink a weak poison prior to the meeting with the king, and then he would drink the pharmacist's strong poison, which would neutralize the weak poison. As his own poison he would bring water, which will have no effect on him, but the pharmacist who would drink the water, and then his poison would surely die. When the pharmacist figured out this plan, he decided to bring water as well. So the treasurer who drank poison earlier, drank the pharmacist's water, then his own water, and died of the poison he drank before. The pharmacist would drink only water, so nothing will happen to him. And because both of them brought the king water, he didn't get a strong poison like he wanted.
Nov 22, 2001
Dec 12, 2001
Jan 25, 2002
Jan 26, 2002
|I really liked this puzzle!|
Feb 09, 2002
|That was cool|
Feb 10, 2002
|In fact is WAS cool... reading the answer that is. For I could not solve it... and not unlike Mr. Owl, I "bit" into the chewy center after only 3 licks.|
Mar 26, 2002
|I came up with a few different possible scenarios, but that is tough! Really good presentation of the problem too. Great job!|
Mar 26, 2002
Mar 28, 2002
|Fun and well written!|
Mar 30, 2002
Apr 11, 2002
Apr 12, 2002
|this ones so good that I just cannot tell you!|
Apr 24, 2002
|Wow great job!|
May 02, 2002
|I really liked this one... very nice...|
p.s.- me eifo ata? yesh leha shem ivri...
May 12, 2002
|One of the best I have seen on here - very good.|
May 19, 2002
|Very long, but it was WELL worth the wait, did U see that somewhere, or did U make it up? Either way, VERY good and VERY entertaining!|
Jun 05, 2002
|Note for potential treasurers (and pharmacists I guess!) If you take a poison which is slightly stronger than the poison you drink before going in, you'll be OK and the pharmacist will die. (as long as he still brings water.) Your slightly stronger poison will neutralise your earlier inbibed one, but still kill the sneaky pharmacist. Ha ha. So you can never be too sure! Still a superb teaser, one of my top 3 definitely.|
Jun 06, 2002
|A great teaser. Yet, I feel it needs to be made clear that the 'antidote' poison loses its deadly qualities as it neutralises the prior, weaker venom.|
I was hung up on the idea that to survive, one would need to continually consume stronger and stronger poison!
Jun 16, 2002
|i thought that |
Jun 16, 2002
|i thought that 1 of them had killed the other and they all lived happyley ever after!|
Jun 29, 2002
Jul 06, 2002
|I like this riddle is good, but sortof copfusing.|
Jul 09, 2002
|Excellent presentation. I really enjoyed reading and contemplating this one.|
Jul 15, 2002
|i thought the pharmasist was going to bring nothing so i was sorta close|
Jul 17, 2002
Jul 22, 2002
|Okay its not really the same but it reminded my of that scene in the princess bride... heh|
Jul 28, 2002
Jul 29, 2002
|OKay! That teaser was soo awesome...definately one of my favs! I give you mad props on that one! It was super clever!|
Jul 29, 2002
I have never seen anything like that. Igot confused snd I liked it
Jul 30, 2002
|Not too shabby |
Aug 08, 2002
|its pretty long and confusing.. but i understood it wen i read the answer|
Aug 15, 2002
|If there's one bad poison teaser, I haven't heard it!|
Aug 19, 2002
|That is one truly fantastic teaser!!!|
Oct 11, 2002
|I must say - very cool teaser. |
Great explanation of the given facts.
I was excited to see that the answer
was exactly as I had guessed. I am
rarely that close to the answer on
a teaser that's so involved.
Oct 23, 2002
|Very well writen and pretty difficult.|
Nov 23, 2002
|I love how you wrote this story. It was very good in the biggest font ever. GREAT JOB!!!!!!|
Dec 20, 2002
|good one, I've seen this one on another site. |
Dec 20, 2002
|Very well done Yanivster. I would have to say that this was the best teaser that i've ever read|
Jan 23, 2003
|what a wonderful logic......|
Jan 29, 2003
|That was great!|
Mar 20, 2003
|one word UBAH...very nice teaser..my fav so far|
Apr 04, 2003
Apr 05, 2003
Apr 14, 2003
Apr 20, 2003
|I figured out that there was water involved, but couldn't quite make the connection...well done.|
May 09, 2003
|very nice indeed, job well done!|
May 19, 2003
|thats a good one, made me think about it like a good brain tease should|
May 23, 2003
|Wow ... nice job! Really liked it! ~Tangi~|
Jun 18, 2003
|I could've used a clue or two.|
Jul 05, 2003
|I saw this exact puzzle, word for word, on another website. But its a brilliant puzzle so that doesn't matter. )|
Jul 10, 2003
|THIS ONE IS AWEOSME!! if there is/was an award for best riddle/puzzle this would have my vote!!|
Aug 09, 2003
|This was very good, but at one point you called it a poison- not a potion.|
Aug 12, 2003
Oct 16, 2003
|way cool....... i thought for some reason the king would end up with nothing but i didn't realize how til' i read the answer. Really really really smart. |
Oct 16, 2003
|i tihnk you mean to say they drank the POISON as planned.|
Jan 15, 2004
|Fantastic teaser, easily the best i have read!!!!|
Jan 15, 2004
Feb 09, 2004
|That was a very interesting and confusing one! I like it, it's 'cool'... |
Feb 21, 2004
|Very Clever! Iwould have never guessed! |
Jun 25, 2004
|Woaaaaaaaah, that was so awesome! Great!|
Jun 29, 2004
|Sorry guys, but this one doesn't work...|
The basic premise of the problem is that it takes a STRONG POISON to cancel a WEAK POISON. Therefore the treasurer's plan to bring water to the competition would have killed him (he would drink the water, and then drink the pharmacist's poison and then die from it).
We can't say that water is the "weakest poison" because that would imply that anything is a weak poison, and therefore no poison could ever have effect (because it would be, by definition, always following a weaker poison... and therefore an antidote)
Jul 22, 2004
|What happened to the pharmacist after that knowing that he didn't do what the KING told him? |
Jul 23, 2004
|i liked this teaser. |
Jul 28, 2004
|WOW! excellent, quite long but worth the wait, keep it up! very good |
Aug 09, 2004
|Outstanding teaser |
Nov 09, 2004
|Brilliant. Absolutely Brilliant.|
Nov 15, 2004
|I love it when a logic puzzle tests my logic like this one. Good teaser|
Feb 09, 2005
|To the favorites! |
May 18, 2005
|Sweet! I like it. |
Jul 02, 2005
|i liked it- i got the answer wrong- but it was still very good |
May 04, 2006
|good teaser |
Jul 30, 2006
|Very good and well-written teaser! Definitely going on my favourites!|
Aug 03, 2006
|Man, that bugged me for quite a while. But it felt so good when i finally figured it out. Nice teaser|
Oct 31, 2006
|I love this one. I was determined to figure this out and finally, after wracking my brain over this for a while, I got it.|
Dec 18, 2006
|Great job! I couldn't figure it out until I saw the answer. Very clever.|
Jan 15, 2007
|This is the most coolest teaser I've ever seen|
Mar 25, 2007
|WOW!!... GREAT TEASER|
Jun 02, 2007
|well written, fun, and i loved it.|
Apr 14, 2008
Andy1608 said: If the treasurer now realizes, that the pharmacist will also bring water?
He the can switch back to poison and still win.
But what if the pharmacist realizes that the treasurer realized that he realized ... and switch back to poison as well?
What happens, if one drinks 3 poisons in a row, weak->strong->strongest.
Will you survive?
If yes, then there is a sure solution for the pharmacist:
drink the weakest poison there is before and bring in the strongest there is to the king.
If it is a toggle: no sure way ....
Nov 11, 2008
|If they both brought water then how could either of them die? It said that the treasurer's poison was water so he couldn't have died from that poison which was the first one.|
Jan 03, 2009
|While it was pretty easy to figure out, I liked this one because the answer was logically tight. Some of the teasers of this style have an arbitrary aspect.|
Mar 16, 2009
|Not sure why there is so much confusion over the answer... it is pretty plain and simply explained.|
The treasurer expected the pharmacist to make a strong poison, so the treasurer's plan was to drink water. Since a stronger poison neutralizes a weaker poison, the treasurer would drink a very weak poison ahead of time. Thus we would have the following:
T0 = weak poison
T1 = weak poison + pharmacist's poison = neutral
T2 = neutralized poison + water
P0 = nothing
P1 = nothing + water
P2 = water + pharmacist's posion
Clearly the pharmacist would die.
The pharmacist expected this plan and knew he would drink water from the treaurer then would be killed by his own poison, so he decided to bring water as well:
T0 = weak poison
T1 = weak poison + water
T2 = weak poision + water + water
P0 = nothing
P1 = water
P2 = water + water
In this scenario, the treasurer would die, the pharmacist would live, and the king would have water thinking it was the strongest poison in the kingdom.
This is a logic puzzle, and as such you have to take the premises as fact. It may not make logical sense that a strong poison could neutralize a weaker poison, but that is irrelevant in this case as it is an assumed fact.
Very well done logic problem!
Jul 08, 2009
|This was very logical and I loved it.|
Couldn't solve it but I am happy with the answer.
Feb 05, 2010
|Solved it. Though, I'm not usually good at these, got lucky |
Feb 23, 2013
|I figured it out to the point that they'd both bring water. I just never got how the treasurer could survive. I guess I assumed that if he'd have anything before their "poison-drinking tournament", he'd die before the tournament started. Kinda arbitrary I guess. Good teaser! |
Aug 05, 2014
|I was very happy to see that this riddle is on here, because it is one of my very favourite riddles.|
Mar 18, 2016
|This assumes two things:|
1) The treasurer had no way to build a stronger poison than the pharmacist.
2) The treasurer wasn't going to bring poison for the pharmacist.
If the treasurer tried to make poison (even if it was a weak poison), the pharmacist would have drunk it and then water, and would have died.
This riddle gets 1 star.
Back to Top