All cats have ten tails!

N

nezenic

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Apr 12, 2007
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What?


No cat has nine tails..
All cats have one more tail than no cat...

Therefore... All cats have one more tail than that which has nine tails.

All cats have ten tails!

I have not taken a class on Logic yet, and I'm sure that this type of "fallacy" isn't something that is new, but I just heard this one, and I thought it was interesting. Does anyone else have any more examples of statements like these that are pretty interesting?
 
nezenic said:
No cat has nine tails..
All cats have one more tail than no cat...
Therefore... All cats have one more tail than that which has nine tails.
All cats have ten tails!
Click to expand...
Common sense is quite useful.

#1 Discussion

"no cat" is NOT a cat. This makes the third statement quite senseless. We have heard nothing of anything that has nine tails.

"no cat" might be 0 Cat. That would have 0 tail. One more than zero (0) tail would be one (1) tail.

#2 Discussion

"no cat" might be a dog, which normally would have one (1) tail, so I really don't like the problem as it is stated.

#3 Discussion

Nine (9) is quite arbitrary. What's stopping you from using \(\displaystyle \sqrt{2}\)? So all cats have \(\displaystyle \left(1+\sqrt{2}\right)\) tails?
 
Jack is the slowest swimmer on Earth, so swims faster than nobody.
Nobody can swim at 100 mph.
 
Tom: How many did you get correct on your math test?
Bob: Zero! Nada! Nothing!
Tom: Wow! That's bad. Nothing is worse than nothing.
Bob: Aha! Therefore 0<0.
Tom: I was wrong. You deserve a negative score.
 
Which is better: complete happiness or a ham sandwich?

Answer: a ham sandwich.


Proof

Nothing is better than a complete happiness: \(\displaystyle \:0 \:>\:\text{complete happiness}\)

A ham sandwich is better than nothing: \(\displaystyle \:\text{ham sandwich}\:> \:0\)

Since "better than" is a transitive relation,
. . we have: \(\displaystyle \:\text{ham sandwich} \:> \: 0 \:> \:\text{complete happiness}\)

Therefore: a ham sandwich is better than complete happiness.

 
No cat has nine tails..
All cats have one more tail than no cat...

Therefore... All cats have one more tail than that which has nine tails.

All cats have ten tails!

I have not taken a class on Logic yet, and I'm sure that this type of "fallacy" isn't something that is new, but I just heard this one, and I thought it was interesting. Does anyone else have any more examples of statements like these that are pretty interesting

The original of this oldie goes like this:

Theorem: A cat has nine tails.
Proof:
No cat has eight tails. A cat has one tail more than no cat. Therefore, a cat has nine tails.

All of this type of riddle have misguiding statement(s). As tkhunny points out, "no cat" is not a cat as used in "A cat has one more tail than no cat."

Here are a few others that might amuse you.

Seven is an odd number. How can it be made even?
Take away the S.

Why is an hourglass made small in the middle?
To illustrate the waist of time.

If a man smashed a clock, could he be accused of killing time?
Not if he could prove that the clock struck first.

Why is simplifying a fraction like powdering your nose?
It improves the appearance without changing the value.

What math is discussed between seabirds?
Intergull calculus.

What do mathematicians sleep on?
Matrices, of course.
 
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