Puzzle | Paradox Dragons

There are three dragons: one always speaks the truth, one always lies, and one alternates between truth and lies.

A series of conversations takes place between Ram and the three dragons, which allows him to identify the nature of each dragon.

• Dragon 1: "You may ask us one question, then you must guess which dragon is which."
• Dragon 2: "He’s lying. You may get three questions."
• Dragon 3: "Oh no. It’s definitely one question."
• Ram: "What would the second dragon say if I were to ask it if the 3rd dragon had been lying when it agreed with the first one that I could ask only one question?"
• Dragon 1: He’d say, “Yes, the 3rd dragon was lying.”

Then Ram asked a second question addressed to all three dragons, but they remained silent.

The puzzle was solved. Explain — How the Puzzle Was Solved?

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

Solution:

Based on the silence after Ram asked the second question, it can be inferred that asking of one question was true as said by Dragon 1.

So Dragon 1 and Dragon 3 are speaking the truth for the first time.

This raises two cases:

Now let's analyse each case.

Case 1:

If this case is true, Dragon 1's statement "Dragon 2 will say that Dragon 3 is lying" would have been a lie. If Dragon 1 lies, then Dragon 2's statement would be "Dragon 3 is saying the truth", but according to Case 1, Dragon 2 always lie and Dragon 3 always speaks the truth. These statements contradict with the case of Dragon 3 always speaking the truth.

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Case 2:

If this case is True, Dragon 1's statement "Dragon 2 will say that Dragon 3 is lying" would be true. So Dragon 2's statement would be "Dragon 3 is lying" which would be a lie. Hence Case 2 is correct.

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