Puzzle | Blind man and Pills

A blind man is stranded on a deserted island. He has two blue pills and two red pills. Each day, he must take exactly one blue pill and one red pill. If he takes the wrong combination, he will die. Since he is blind, he cannot distinguish between the pills.

How can he ensure that he always takes exactly one blue pill and one red pill?

Check if you were right - full answer with solution below.

Solution:

👁 _blind_man_and_pills1

• The blind man can solve the problem by dividing all the pills into equal halves.
• First, he breaks each of the four pills into two halves. After doing this, he has four halves of blue pills and four halves of red pills.
• Next, he divides these halves into two equal groups, where each group contains two halves of blue pills and two halves of red pills.
• On the first day, he takes one group. The two blue halves together make one full blue pill, and the two red halves make one full red pill.
• On the second day, he takes the remaining group, which again gives him exactly one blue pill and one red pill.
• In this way, without needing to identify the pills, he always takes the correct combination.