The Tree of Knowledge, Daniel Miller [unputdownable books txt] 📗

puzzles are going to help me navigate the real world, Professor.”

“Well, why don’t we try a few right now and we’ll find out.”

Turner glanced at Albert and chortled with a knowing grin. Ying looked around at the chuckling, older white men and suddenly felt distinctly outside of the club. It was a feeling she had felt before, and she dealt with it as she had in the past . . . with bulldog-like persistence.

“Alright, bring it on, old man!”

Turner’s smile dropped at the slight, but he pressed on. “OK. Here are the rules, Ms. Koh. I am going to describe a situation that is not quite what it seems. The more logical you are in your approach to asking questions, the more expeditiously you will be able to derive the answer. You will then be allowed to ask me—”

“Yes or no questions in order to find the answer,” interrupted Ying. “Yes, I know how this works. Give me your best shot.” She cracked her knuckles like a brawler before a fight.

“Perfect. Then let’s commence. Here is your first puzzle. Seven people are found dead in a cabin in the woods. They all died at the same time, but there are no footprints in or out. How did they die?”

Ying looked out the window, attempting to picture this cabin. “Is this cabin a house?”

“I’ll take the Q and A part, Angus,” said Albert. “No.”

Ying sat up in her chair. “Aha. So, this is not a typical cabin. Is it made of wood?”

“No.”

“Is it made out of metal?”

“Yes.” Albert smiled, knowing the end was nigh.

“It’s an airplane cabin! The people died in an airplane crash.”

“Well done, Ms. Koh,” exclaimed Turner.

“Thank you, thank you,” said Ying, mock bowing from the back seat.

“But, tell me this . . . when I first told you about the cabin, what did you picture?”

Ying thought back to the horrifying scene she had visualized. “I pictured a log cabin full of dead bodies.”

“Exactly. And that is the challenge of using the Tree of Knowledge in everyday life. Our brains are so filled with assumptions and images, emotions and fears, that it clouds our ability to focus on the pure information that we have been given. The second we picture that cabin as a log cabin and imagine those dead bodies, we have begun to let emotion overwhelm the logical process. The pure logical process would tell us that the word ‘cabin’ is ambiguous and so our first step must be to clarify what the meaning of the word ‘cabin’ is.”

“Aristotle’s law of identity,” added Ying.

“Precisely,” said Turner.

“Let’s do another. I’m on a roll now.”

Turner thought back to some of his favorite puzzles. “Ah, this is a doozy. A man pushes his car up to a hotel. The hotel owner says to him, ‘You owe me five hundred dollars,’ at which point the man announces that he is now bankrupt. Your charge, Ms. Koh, is to determine why.”

Ying took a long look out the car window at the dark forest speeding by and gathered her thoughts.

“Did the man owe the hotel owner money for staying at the hotel?”

Turner smiled as he observed Ying’s intellect grinding away.

“No, it’s not money for staying at the hotel,” replied Albert.

“Is it for some other past debt?” asked Ying.

“Nope.”

“So, it’s because he parked the car at the hotel?”

“Yes,” said Albert with a smirk.

“This guy is paying five hundred dollars for parking?”

“No.”

“But you said it’s because he parked the car at the hotel.”

“Yes.”

At this piece of information, Ying’s brow furrowed and she began to hum. She often hummed when she was thinking, a habit that Albert thought quite odd.

After a few minutes of steady humming, Ying resumed her questioning. “OK, let me focus on the car. He’s pushing it, right?”

“Correct.”

“Is the car broken?”

“Nope,” said Albert, as pleased with himself as though he had invented the riddle.

“Is this a large car? I mean, I’m not sure I could push a car even with these guns,” said Ying, flexing her practically nonexistent muscles and chuckling.

“No.”

“Is the car smaller than a Mini?”

“Yes.”

“Is the car a real, functioning automobile?”

“No.”

“So, it’s a toy car. Aha,” shouted Ying, shaking Albert’s shoulders from the back seat.

As his shoulders shook, Albert looked at Turner, who seemed to be enjoying Ying’s progress.

“Yes, it is,” said Albert.

“OK, let me get this straight. A man pushes a toy car up to a hotel, and the owner tells him he owes him five hundred dollars?”

“Yes.”

“Why would a guy push a toy car up to a hotel? Was there a convention and he was selling the toy car?”

Albert laughed. “No.”

“Aaaargh! What the heck? Why would a man push a toy car up to a hotel? It makes no sense.”

After another pause and quiet round of humming, Ying resumed her questioning.

“Was the man outside when he pushed the car?”

“No, and you’ve got two minutes.”

“So he was inside the hotel?”

“No.”

“But I thought you said he pushed his car up to a hotel?”

“Yes,” Albert said, fondly remembering his past efforts to solve this riddle.

“How can you push a car up to a hotel and not be either inside or outside?” said Ying, visibly flushed.

“Yes or no questions, please,” said Albert sarcastically.

“Professor Turner, this feels rigged. Is this a joke?”

Turner shook his head. “No, Ms. Koh. This isn’t a joke. Keep going. You’re on the right track, but remember . . . to be successful, you have to disregard assumption and pursue logic.”

“I am a logical machine right now.”

“Regardless, you’re going to have to put your riddle-solving on hold for a moment because we need to make a quick stop at this little pub.” And with that, Turner pulled off the country road they’d been navigating down and onto the unpaved parking lot of a bar with a large neon sign that read “Tim’s Toolbox.”

Tim’s Toolbox was little more than a shed covered in neon beer signs of brands long since deceased. The parking lot consisted of a unique combination of pebbles and dirt that caused the rear end of Turner’s Buick to slip and slide as it