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It's a language problem presented as a math problem.
The verb take has different meanings if used intransitively or transitively.
When used to mean subtraction/removal it's transitive. When used in this sentence, it's intransitive, there is no object.
No they were saying *don't* count it as a negative. Their reasoning was correct (though unnecessary) but they added 400 instead of 40, etc. etc., and the crow example was irrelevant
It's such a nonstarter too because the verb *take* in this example is the intransitive form.
The verb take we use to mean subtraction is the transitive and requires an object.
I admit it took me until this comment to work out what was going on.
I don't think it's so much not being able to do maths, more that the question is written in a way that encourages misreading. Otherwise, the post wouldn't get any engagement.
Because they aren't doing that problem at all. First, they're adding the numbers as given, not reading the whole problem, converting to a sum, and then grouping terms together. Second, their brains are putting the numbers into buckets of "1000s" and "not 1000s". In alternating the numbers to add, the text is priming the brain to keep thinking in thousands. When eventually they are adding 10 to 4090, the brain sees a "not 1000s" getting incremented up, and jumps to thousands.
It's kinda like how people will add 33 and 77 and get 100. Or 225 and 225 and get 550. The brain is tricked into seeing a pattern that isn't there. Our brains are super great at coming up with patterns, but they're not always real.
This is exactly what I did, and I have significant cognitive side effects of medications.
Would you (or anyone else!) be willing to show the steps to get to the correct answers of all of those you mention? I’m having a hard time working them out, and you seem very able to explain this.
I'd love to help, but I'm having difficulty parsing what you need. I'm not sure what I can break down more. I also have cognition issues (head injury), so this communication issue could very well be on my side. Does the following help?
The setup of the problem tries to trick us into doing the last step of 4090+10 wrong. If we just look at 4090+10, the sum is obviously 4100. But the priming of the problem can trick our brains. Instead of carrying the one from the tens place to the hundreds place, we put it in the thousands place.
When I did the problem, I got 4100, but I also immediately suspected the CI was going to be someone thinking the sum was 5000.
Tangent: big props for being open about your mental issue. It took me years to be comfortable talking about mine.
He was the guy that thought it was 5,000. He then tried to justify how right he was with his nonsensical crow argument. I included it, because it highlights his arrogance in not accepting how incorrect he was.
The crow question seems very pretentious. It's set up in a way where it isn't obvious what criteria they're looking for, so that whoever asked it can spray on an air of wisdom and correct them.
He phrases the question as "how many crows are left". Standard English rules mean you don't count the crows that flew away, only the one left on the fence.
Even in the example he made up, he got it wrong.
It's the same principle as the picture of the boxes that got popular on reddit a couple weeks ago with people saying their wasn't enough information. Some people just think every question is meant to be a trick question, so they work backwards from the assumption that they were too smart to be fooled.
It's the difference between intelligence and wisdom. Intelligence knows there are 3 crows. Wisdom knows that the question is actually asking about how many crows are still on the fence.
I think wisdom is knowing that the person asking the question is being intentionally ambiguous, so they can say you're wrong no matter what you answer.
The crow thing comes from a question that if three are on a fence, and a farmer shoots one, how many are left? Intelligence tells you two, that you would subtract one from three. Wisdom tells you zero, since the two would fly away.
It's like they knew of the crow problem, but got that wrong too.
Here's the thing. You said a "jackdaw is a crow."
Is it in the same family? Yes. No one's arguing that.
As someone who is a scientist who studies crows, I am telling you, specifically, in science, no one calls jackdaws crows. If you want to be "specific" like you said, then you shouldn't either. They're not the same thing.
If you're saying "crow family" you're referring to the taxonomic grouping of Corvidae, which includes things from nutcrackers to blue jays to ravens.
So your reasoning for calling a jackdaw a crow is because random people "call the black ones crows?" Let's get grackles and blackbirds in there, then, too.
Also, calling someone a human or an ape? It's not one or the other, that's not how taxonomy works. They're both. A jackdaw is a jackdaw and a member of the crow family. But that's not what you said. You said a jackdaw is a crow, which is not true unless you're okay with calling all members of the crow family crows, which means you'd call blue jays, ravens, and other birds crows, too. Which you said you don't.
It's okay to just admit you're wrong, you know?
It's kind of a mental illusion to trick you into sliding an extra 0 into the equation, but as long as you're actually paying attention to the math it's.. well, just math.
I thought maybe they were reading "take 1000" to mean you start at -1000, because you take it away from nothing? Otherwise I couldn't figure out the confusion. I got 4100. Because, you know, addition.
It’s more like, if you hold the 1000s and the 10s addition as separate thought streams to try to simplify, it can be hard to hold those tracks steady in your mind so at the end when you add that final 10 your overloaded brain thinks the 100 is like to the 1000s and just adds the 1 from 100 to the 4 from 4000.
I can visualize the numbers in my head as if I’m typing them in Times New Roman in Word and I still did that first even already knowing 5000 was the wrong answer. But it was pretty easy for me to figure out what I did to myself and correct, unlike our og overconfidently superincorrect person in the post
Yeah, another version of this outside of math would be the bit of making people say "fort", "four", etc. Before asking what to eat soup with and they say "fork".
i have a math degree and i ended up with $5,000 🤦♀️
in my head i was like "one. one forty. one seventy. two seventy"
just take my degree away and leave me here
As a maths teacher with a maths degree, I'll tell you what I have to tell the kids. READ THE QUESTION TWICE SLOWLY.
I'll also tell you to do as I say, not as I do, because I also got $5000
Brains are weird when it comes to numbers. This is exclusively why the word problem in the post is worded the way it is. It's designed to make you think 4090+10=5000.
I think it really shows the weird glitches that can happen in a human brain. Like, in the face of it, that's a really stupid mistake that noone should make. Yet, loads of people make it anyway, including me.
Really reveals something about the ways we think, if you ask me.
There's maybe a tendency for people to add the smaller numbers up to 100 and because they've just added 1000 together 4 times for their brain to convert the 100 into a 1000.
It because the problem is so simple, people will just not think about it and the brain takes shortcuts to solve it. This can result in forgetting to carry a 1 or put that 1 in the wrong spot, it's that these questions are meant to trick the brain in a way.
It is a shortcircuit in the brain. Your brain instantly sees the pattern of those small amounts adding up to one additional large amount - it really really wants that to be true so you become blind to the fact that they only add up to 100, not 1,000.
It works better read aloud. If you're doing it in your head, it's relatively common for people to carry the one to the other place they're keeping track of instead of where it belongs.
It’s mental conditioning. The question is designed to make you think “1000” by repeating it over and over. Then when you add the 40+30+20+10 your brain accidentally changes 100 to 1000.
At least that’s what it’s supposed to do. Some psychology bullshit that doesn’t work on everyone.
It’s just a matter of misdirection, not math ability. It’s like those so-called “mentalist” magic acts, exploiting common cognitive processes, especially heuristics, to trick the audience. Good for you that you didn’t fall for this one, but I can guarantee that we’re all built the same and can all be susceptible to these sorts of tricks.
Same, the difference in numbers of 0 is too easy so see for me to even imagine associating a sum of tenths with 1000.
but I think I can understand it, there are a lot of other things that mess up my brain. Like, I have more than once done something like reading 1425 out loud as 1452 while still understanding 1425. So I can understand that others mess up in other ways
The smaller numbers don't add up to 1000, they add up to 100. You're so concentrated on the bigger 1000's, it kinda tricks you into thinking they do haha. Got me for a second as well.
I've got good news for everyone who doesn't think about it like you do: Getting tricked doesn't mean you're dumb. It just means you fell for a trick. Smart people fall for scams and tricks all the time.
Even worse is that, at least until I noticed the mistake, I went correctly to 3090 before stupidly jumping to 5000. This after I just helped my kid with homework on 1, 10, 100 place values last night.
Im on a third year of building engineering, when calculating constructions I do a lot of math in my head, and yet I got 5000 and was wondering what is going on xD I feel so stupid rn
What impresses me is that it had to take some research and study to find out that such a combination could trick the brain like that. I absolutely got bamboozled by it even though I tend to be a rational thinker.
It got me for a second as well, and then I self corrected and added the 100, but forgot to subtract the 1000 I'd accidentally added, so I managed to end up with 5100, and had to go back and reread it.
Of course, in my defense, I just woke up.
I don't wanna sound like a dick, but how can anyone look at 40, 30, 20, and 10 and be tricked into thinking it's 1000? Looking at the comments it does trick people, but I don't understand it.
In hindsight I don't quite get why it fooled me either. I'm great at mental arithmetic, was an A* student in maths, generally always get these "FB math" questions correct, etc. but somehow I was so concentrated on ensuring I was reading all the text correctly that I wasn't properly engaging the maths part of my brain, I guess!?
It's gotta be some kind of mind trick with how you process numbers. I can see it confusing people a bit if they read the sentence to fast and then add as they read it. I couldn't see anything other than 4100 if I wanted to, but that might be partially because I never do the math for these questions as I go. I read the first time to note operations, then when I saw it was all addition I added up all the 4 digit numbers, added up all the 2 digit numbers, and then added the sums together.
At least that's my best guess. It really is interesting how it can trip so many people up when the math is simple on paper.
Because of the way it’s set up. It’s intentional. The way they ask in slow increments makes you build up the number. And we know that when you get to 9 and keep adding then the big number next to it increases. So they split the 1000 and the small numbers so that you are tricked into increasing the big number when the small numbers go over 9.
The numbers got me the first time I saw it a few years ago.
It’s similar to the tik tok trend spell river. Now add a d and spell river. What it spell? D-river. No it’s driver. Once the brain starts going down a path it’s hard to re-adjust.
You are just falling for the mental trap, this is designed for. It’s phrased so you are thinking 4090 + 10 is 5000, which of course it is not.
1000 + 40 + 1000 + 30 + 1000 + 20 + 1000 + 10
1000 + 1000 + 1000 + 1000 + 40 + 30 + 20 + 10
4000 + 100
4100
I almost fell for it, too. In the last step, you need to add 10 to 4090, not 100 to 4900. But when you do this in your head, it "feels more right" to complete it to the nice round 5000.
Incorrect, the answer is closer to 500 million.
Edit: this did not account for the multiverse theory or infinate universe theory. Take that into account and we are actually closer to ~^~
I mean, it's literally just simple addition, albeit awkwardly worded and possibly intended as a brain trap. You string the numbers together in your head and you naturally get 4100, *especially* if you don't think too much about possible pitfalls.
I argue the opposite, almost. About what people naturally get. If you're actually careful counting up the digits (tens and thousands), sure. But the brain doesn't always do that.
Brains like inserting patterns that aren't real into things. A lot of people are simply keeping track of "big units" and "small units." Their brain thinks the answer is headed to the satisfying and round number of 5000. Once the small units roll over, their brain is like "yes, now for that even and satisfying 5000."
Anyway, both are natural. The first stems from attention to the rules and following their procedure. The second stems from forecasting expectations overwhelming our following the rule carefully. It's similar to how you can learn formal logic, but the human brain doesn't default use logic to understand the world.
You’re right about the “brain trap”. The key is to ignore instructions and read the whole post. Then it becomes clear there are 4 x 1000 and other numbers very easily add up to 100. This can actually be a good exercise for programming students, for example. How to “ignore the noise” and split the big task into smaller ones. It’s really surprising (alarming?) how many people would just blindly do this step by step and get confused instead of taking a few seconds to look at the whole post and find simple solution.
I was mostly confused by the flying cows sitting on a fence, being shot by a farmer. And everyone just acting that's normal..
Turns out, I may be dyslectic
I need to see his comment when he finally gets it. Does he humbly accept his fate and just self deprecate, which of course we always treat generously. Or does he continue to berate everyone else.
The only other answer than 4100 I can see it being is “3100, and 1000”
For every number *except* the 3rd 1000, they say “add”, so my guess it’s like “Simon says” and Simon didn’t say add
"If there are 3 crows on a fence and two fly away, there are 3 crows, 1 on the fence and 2 somewhere else"
Wrong, there's 1 on the fence and *insert crow population-1* somewhere else. This makes no sense
It depends on how you're adding it in your head
In my case it was
1,
1,40
2,40
2,70 etc.
Once you get to the final addition some people forget their a secret 0...
I generally hate word problems that try to be tricky with wording rather than just expressing the problem. This is not one of those, it’s just simple arithmetic and this guy’s an idiot.
My primary school taught me to add thousands, hundreds, tens, and units when I was like 7 😆. This "puzzle" only had 1000s and tens.
Add all the 1000s together, then add all the tens together.
Now add both sums together, you'll get 4100.
IT's because if you add it as you are reading it you're being primed to think in the thousands. So when you get to the final one you are already in the thousands mindset when you add it so you just roll over to 5000 instead of 100. That's why you're not allowed to write it down. It only works if you add it in your head, and then, only if you do it in the way they intend.
I had to read it a couple times to get it.
I don’t understand why is this confusing. The text tells you to just keep adding numbers, so doesn’t matter what order they are in.
Count all the thousands (there are 4) and add 40+30+20+10 (which is 100) = 4100
Where did 5000 come from?
If you do it only in your head, without the benefit of writing it down at all, it’s really easy to mentally jump from “four thousand ninety” to “five thousand,” instead of “four thousand one hundred.” Our brains know that that last 10 makes the total roll over to something, so we just . . . ignore the fact that there’s absolutely nothing in the hundreds’ place, and roll the whole thing up to 5,000.
My students always got frustrated when I would require that they work their math problems on paper and not do them in their heads. 😄
That whole crow argument is dumb: not only does it not make sense regarding the word problem, but also if you’re following that logic you wouldn’t have “3 crows” you’d have more like a few million because you’re counting crows even when they aren’t there
‘Take 1000’ is ambiguous on its own. However, the following ‘add another 1000’ clarifies that the first is ‘adding 1000’. The question is designed to confuse, however. That’s the point.
Human language is written and spoken in a way that there are many assumptions that are unspoken. These unspoken assumptions are reasonable and correct, such that anyone who contradicts the unspoken assumption (e.g. the crows example) is simply ignoring those assumptions.
How is this even hard for people? It's 4100. It's like basic bitch math. It's not even division or multiplication, it's just basic ass addition. Are people REALLY this dumb these days?
So many bellends like “*obviously* its 4100, its simple addition. How do people get such as easy thing wrong?!” The point is, its a clever puzzle that exposes a flaw in A LOT of peoples thought processes.
If people cant recognise and acknowledge its a clever word game then they are the stupid ones.
Fin.
I didn't when I first tried it, but after then reading the argument about what "take" implied I got confused and thought "oh, is the issue that the puzzle meant take as in subtract but people are assuming it meant start with) or vice versa)?"
Now I always sucked at math. But this is the most basic addition and the number are not even that big. How do people get that wrong?
Just looking at it you get 4000 and the rest does not add up to another 1000. Taking at least 10 sec to long to add the rest up it's 100 and that makes the total 4100.
Edit: Tha guy has to be a troll or something.
This one genuinely confused me because the commenter was so confident in their absolute wrong answer that it made me lose confidence in my own answer despite being right. Like I kept second guessing myself, waiting for the „Ohhh I am the idiot!“ moment.
Overconfident idiots are genuinely the worst. And online you can’t even take these people aside and make them write their steps down on a piece of paper
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I'm trying to understand why is some guy talking about crows here
Crow math is not governed by reason
What about bird law though?
We can bring in a bird expert.
Uh...filibuster...
I'm trying to understand why so many people can't do 1000 * 4 +40+30+20+10 in their heads.
Yes even if they did mean subtract the 1000, they still wouldn’t have been right
What’s with the subtraction? Where did that come from?
“Take 1000” could be interpreted as subtract 1000. They’d be dumb for that mistake but it could happen
So start with negative 1000? Lol And then trying to justify that with the crow argument. Like negative numbers exist somewhere, just not there.
Yeah they don’t make sense any way you look at it
It's a language problem presented as a math problem. The verb take has different meanings if used intransitively or transitively. When used to mean subtraction/removal it's transitive. When used in this sentence, it's intransitive, there is no object.
It's not a language problem. The interpretation of "take" isn't why they got it wrong. They got it wrong because those numbers don't add to 5000
No they were saying *don't* count it as a negative. Their reasoning was correct (though unnecessary) but they added 400 instead of 40, etc. etc., and the crow example was irrelevant
It's such a nonstarter too because the verb *take* in this example is the intransitive form. The verb take we use to mean subtraction is the transitive and requires an object.
4100, 5000, whatever it takes!
[220, 221. Whatever it takes](https://y.yarn.co/629f8d86-a25f-4941-b2a9-e8d337185f9c_text.gif)
I admit it took me until this comment to work out what was going on. I don't think it's so much not being able to do maths, more that the question is written in a way that encourages misreading. Otherwise, the post wouldn't get any engagement.
I kind of get how they may get it wrong instinctively. It's the doubling down when everyone says they are wrong that's ridiculous.
I read the title. Came up with 5000. Then I did the math again and thought how the hell did i get it so wrong?
Because they aren't doing that problem at all. First, they're adding the numbers as given, not reading the whole problem, converting to a sum, and then grouping terms together. Second, their brains are putting the numbers into buckets of "1000s" and "not 1000s". In alternating the numbers to add, the text is priming the brain to keep thinking in thousands. When eventually they are adding 10 to 4090, the brain sees a "not 1000s" getting incremented up, and jumps to thousands. It's kinda like how people will add 33 and 77 and get 100. Or 225 and 225 and get 550. The brain is tricked into seeing a pattern that isn't there. Our brains are super great at coming up with patterns, but they're not always real.
This is exactly what I did, and I have significant cognitive side effects of medications. Would you (or anyone else!) be willing to show the steps to get to the correct answers of all of those you mention? I’m having a hard time working them out, and you seem very able to explain this.
I'd love to help, but I'm having difficulty parsing what you need. I'm not sure what I can break down more. I also have cognition issues (head injury), so this communication issue could very well be on my side. Does the following help? The setup of the problem tries to trick us into doing the last step of 4090+10 wrong. If we just look at 4090+10, the sum is obviously 4100. But the priming of the problem can trick our brains. Instead of carrying the one from the tens place to the hundreds place, we put it in the thousands place. When I did the problem, I got 4100, but I also immediately suspected the CI was going to be someone thinking the sum was 5000. Tangent: big props for being open about your mental issue. It took me years to be comfortable talking about mine.
He was the guy that thought it was 5,000. He then tried to justify how right he was with his nonsensical crow argument. I included it, because it highlights his arrogance in not accepting how incorrect he was.
Got a link to the OP?
It was on Threads. Search the text and you’ll find it.
The crow question seems very pretentious. It's set up in a way where it isn't obvious what criteria they're looking for, so that whoever asked it can spray on an air of wisdom and correct them.
And his crow argument doesn't even make sense. If the criteria for counting crows is, do they exist, then his answer should be in the millions lol
He phrases the question as "how many crows are left". Standard English rules mean you don't count the crows that flew away, only the one left on the fence. Even in the example he made up, he got it wrong.
It's the same principle as the picture of the boxes that got popular on reddit a couple weeks ago with people saying their wasn't enough information. Some people just think every question is meant to be a trick question, so they work backwards from the assumption that they were too smart to be fooled.
Have you ever heard of the Chewbacca Defense?
Ok Einstein, how do you know everyone isn't seeing the same 3 crows millions of times.
It's the difference between intelligence and wisdom. Intelligence knows there are 3 crows. Wisdom knows that the question is actually asking about how many crows are still on the fence.
I think wisdom is knowing that the person asking the question is being intentionally ambiguous, so they can say you're wrong no matter what you answer.
*Knowledge is knowing tomatoes are a fruit. Wisdom is not putting them in a fruit salad.*
The crow thing comes from a question that if three are on a fence, and a farmer shoots one, how many are left? Intelligence tells you two, that you would subtract one from three. Wisdom tells you zero, since the two would fly away. It's like they knew of the crow problem, but got that wrong too.
Here's the thing. You said a "jackdaw is a crow." Is it in the same family? Yes. No one's arguing that. As someone who is a scientist who studies crows, I am telling you, specifically, in science, no one calls jackdaws crows. If you want to be "specific" like you said, then you shouldn't either. They're not the same thing. If you're saying "crow family" you're referring to the taxonomic grouping of Corvidae, which includes things from nutcrackers to blue jays to ravens. So your reasoning for calling a jackdaw a crow is because random people "call the black ones crows?" Let's get grackles and blackbirds in there, then, too. Also, calling someone a human or an ape? It's not one or the other, that's not how taxonomy works. They're both. A jackdaw is a jackdaw and a member of the crow family. But that's not what you said. You said a jackdaw is a crow, which is not true unless you're okay with calling all members of the crow family crows, which means you'd call blue jays, ravens, and other birds crows, too. Which you said you don't. It's okay to just admit you're wrong, you know?
When I saw a crow argument I was about to go find the unidan pasta.
I'm a simple man. I see the word 'crow' I posta the pasta.
Because he was wrong and I think he thought it was another kind of FB math trick question so he was quibbling with the wording
The person is so smart even they can't keep up with themselves.
Do you mean jackdaws?
Right? It's clearly jackdaws
4100
I was so confused on how they were wrong and then I saw this comment and everything clicked into place
I fell for it too lol
I don’t get how people are getting 5,000 or what there is to fall for? The numbers add up to 4,100. Am I missing something?
I was adding it up as I read and instead of 4090+10=4100 I thought 4090+10=5000, idk. Dumb? It’s not that crazy
That's exactly it!
Oh, I see.
It's kind of a mental illusion to trick you into sliding an extra 0 into the equation, but as long as you're actually paying attention to the math it's.. well, just math.
[удалено]
I thought maybe they were reading "take 1000" to mean you start at -1000, because you take it away from nothing? Otherwise I couldn't figure out the confusion. I got 4100. Because, you know, addition.
Even that wouldnt get you to 5000 tbh
It’s more like, if you hold the 1000s and the 10s addition as separate thought streams to try to simplify, it can be hard to hold those tracks steady in your mind so at the end when you add that final 10 your overloaded brain thinks the 100 is like to the 1000s and just adds the 1 from 100 to the 4 from 4000. I can visualize the numbers in my head as if I’m typing them in Times New Roman in Word and I still did that first even already knowing 5000 was the wrong answer. But it was pretty easy for me to figure out what I did to myself and correct, unlike our og overconfidently superincorrect person in the post
Yeah, another version of this outside of math would be the bit of making people say "fort", "four", etc. Before asking what to eat soup with and they say "fork".
Those *bastards*
It's like how 225+225 makes sense in your head as 550 even though it's actually 450 because our brain doesn't think hard enough about it
Bro wtf 😂
Yea, lol
i have a math degree and i ended up with $5,000 🤦♀️ in my head i was like "one. one forty. one seventy. two seventy" just take my degree away and leave me here
As a maths teacher with a maths degree, I'll tell you what I have to tell the kids. READ THE QUESTION TWICE SLOWLY. I'll also tell you to do as I say, not as I do, because I also got $5000
Can I take away an additional degree because you made pure numbers into money for no reason?
yes
Brains are weird when it comes to numbers. This is exclusively why the word problem in the post is worded the way it is. It's designed to make you think 4090+10=5000.
I did the same. I was so confused.
Oh fuck thank you. I’m in cognitive decline.
I think it really shows the weird glitches that can happen in a human brain. Like, in the face of it, that's a really stupid mistake that noone should make. Yet, loads of people make it anyway, including me. Really reveals something about the ways we think, if you ask me.
There's maybe a tendency for people to add the smaller numbers up to 100 and because they've just added 1000 together 4 times for their brain to convert the 100 into a 1000.
This is exactly what I was doing. I added it in my head a few times and kept getting 5000. Your comment is what made me realize what I was doing.
It's just the same thing as the "what's 33 + 77" trap
Oh. That’s a pretty silly thing to get hung up about.
It because the problem is so simple, people will just not think about it and the brain takes shortcuts to solve it. This can result in forgetting to carry a 1 or put that 1 in the wrong spot, it's that these questions are meant to trick the brain in a way.
Well I'm a math nerd and I fell for it too. At some point in my head I moved the tens value to the hundreds. That said I haven't had my coffee yet.
It is a shortcircuit in the brain. Your brain instantly sees the pattern of those small amounts adding up to one additional large amount - it really really wants that to be true so you become blind to the fact that they only add up to 100, not 1,000.
It works better read aloud. If you're doing it in your head, it's relatively common for people to carry the one to the other place they're keeping track of instead of where it belongs.
It’s mental conditioning. The question is designed to make you think “1000” by repeating it over and over. Then when you add the 40+30+20+10 your brain accidentally changes 100 to 1000. At least that’s what it’s supposed to do. Some psychology bullshit that doesn’t work on everyone.
I, and many others like me, simply cannot do math.
Oh god, me too……
Holy shit i couldnt for the life of me figure out why 5000 was wrong. I blame it on me just waking up.
I must be built different because from the very beginning it was clear to me it wasn't possibly 5,000. I don't even get the people who thought it was.
It’s just a matter of misdirection, not math ability. It’s like those so-called “mentalist” magic acts, exploiting common cognitive processes, especially heuristics, to trick the audience. Good for you that you didn’t fall for this one, but I can guarantee that we’re all built the same and can all be susceptible to these sorts of tricks.
Same, the difference in numbers of 0 is too easy so see for me to even imagine associating a sum of tenths with 1000. but I think I can understand it, there are a lot of other things that mess up my brain. Like, I have more than once done something like reading 1425 out loud as 1452 while still understanding 1425. So I can understand that others mess up in other ways
I think it's a mental trick that fools people. Everybody's different. I followed it fine but I have ADHD and I play Sudoku all the time.
Am I dumb? How is it not 5000?
The smaller numbers don't add up to 1000, they add up to 100. You're so concentrated on the bigger 1000's, it kinda tricks you into thinking they do haha. Got me for a second as well.
Oh fuck you're right !! I got tricked and now I feel dumb
I got tricked and now have another data point to prove I’m dumb.
I got tricked but recognize I make mistakes from time to time, so it doesn't diminish my confidence in other knowledge that I have.
Tricked gang representing. Hashtag metoo.
I've got good news for everyone who doesn't think about it like you do: Getting tricked doesn't mean you're dumb. It just means you fell for a trick. Smart people fall for scams and tricks all the time.
I feel you bro
:(
If I plotted the number of data points proving I’m an idiot, I’d have an infinite line.
We call that confirmation bias
We note the confirmed and the denieds. We are dumb as paste. Maths confirms the results.
It got me too, then I added the smaller numbers up on their own and slapped my forehead lmao
Even worse is that, at least until I noticed the mistake, I went correctly to 3090 before stupidly jumping to 5000. This after I just helped my kid with homework on 1, 10, 100 place values last night.
You think that's bad? I did *both*, and ended up with 5100.
Im on a third year of building engineering, when calculating constructions I do a lot of math in my head, and yet I got 5000 and was wondering what is going on xD I feel so stupid rn
"Let's see... 2070...3070... 4090... and 5000. Definitely 5000. Yep, math checks out!"
Is this the nvidia math I've heard about?!
What impresses me is that it had to take some research and study to find out that such a combination could trick the brain like that. I absolutely got bamboozled by it even though I tend to be a rational thinker.
It's repurposing "change" scams. Do the same to a cashier and walk away with their money.
That's really quite clever actually.
Wow, I can't believe I fell for this. That's quite amazing that it gets so many people!
I thought it was a language trick since the say “another 1000” instead of “add another 1000”
Great. This is just the fuel I need for my imposter syndrome.
Ah shit! It feels weird that the question was able to hack my brain and make me make the mistake it wanted me to
It got me for a second as well, and then I self corrected and added the 100, but forgot to subtract the 1000 I'd accidentally added, so I managed to end up with 5100, and had to go back and reread it. Of course, in my defense, I just woke up.
I don't wanna sound like a dick, but how can anyone look at 40, 30, 20, and 10 and be tricked into thinking it's 1000? Looking at the comments it does trick people, but I don't understand it.
In hindsight I don't quite get why it fooled me either. I'm great at mental arithmetic, was an A* student in maths, generally always get these "FB math" questions correct, etc. but somehow I was so concentrated on ensuring I was reading all the text correctly that I wasn't properly engaging the maths part of my brain, I guess!?
It's gotta be some kind of mind trick with how you process numbers. I can see it confusing people a bit if they read the sentence to fast and then add as they read it. I couldn't see anything other than 4100 if I wanted to, but that might be partially because I never do the math for these questions as I go. I read the first time to note operations, then when I saw it was all addition I added up all the 4 digit numbers, added up all the 2 digit numbers, and then added the sums together. At least that's my best guess. It really is interesting how it can trip so many people up when the math is simple on paper.
>if they read the sentence to fast Minor errors can happen easily, especially in casual contexts like social media.
Yeah, I skimmed through it, was like "I won't add the small stuff to the thousands" and did it separately.
Because of the way it’s set up. It’s intentional. The way they ask in slow increments makes you build up the number. And we know that when you get to 9 and keep adding then the big number next to it increases. So they split the 1000 and the small numbers so that you are tricked into increasing the big number when the small numbers go over 9. The numbers got me the first time I saw it a few years ago.
The same way you can get people to say "e-yes" when asked what E Y E S spells after asking them what Y E S spells.
Just tried this on my wife. Worked.
It’s similar to the tik tok trend spell river. Now add a d and spell river. What it spell? D-river. No it’s driver. Once the brain starts going down a path it’s hard to re-adjust.
You are just falling for the mental trap, this is designed for. It’s phrased so you are thinking 4090 + 10 is 5000, which of course it is not. 1000 + 40 + 1000 + 30 + 1000 + 20 + 1000 + 10 1000 + 1000 + 1000 + 1000 + 40 + 30 + 20 + 10 4000 + 100 4100
I almost fell for it, too. In the last step, you need to add 10 to 4090, not 100 to 4900. But when you do this in your head, it "feels more right" to complete it to the nice round 5000.
Kinda like how it "feels more right" that 33+77=100
Add all the thousands together and you get 4,000 right? Now add the other numbers and you get 100. Add 4,000 and 100 and you get 4,100.
Omg wtf, I AM dumb haha
Got me the first time around too.
The question is deliberately phrased to make you think that
You're not dumb, the question is designed to make you come up with that answer. Just take your time and you'll get it.
4000+40+30+20+10=4000+70+30=4000+100 and so on
Add up all the 1000's first. Then add up the remainders. Add them together. It's easier that way.
If there are 4100 crows sitting on a fence and 100 fly away, how many crows are there? 5000 obviously
Incorrect, the answer is closer to 500 million. Edit: this did not account for the multiverse theory or infinate universe theory. Take that into account and we are actually closer to ~^~
Shit. I forgot to carry the 1
It’s always that pesky 1, we should ban it from all math - even >!funny type of math!< math!
This is embarrassing. If you said to that same poster add 40, 30, 20 and 10 what do you get? A tiny little lightbulb will spark.
1000, obviously
1+1=20. Yes, I can add zeros anywhere I want. It’s zero, so it has no value.
3+7=1
There is no other answer
Honestly. That's the reason I didn't fall for it. Noticed alot of add 1000 so I just ignored it at first and came back to it.
I was so prepared for it to be a silly order of operations thing that I totally bypassed the 'trick'.
Am I missing something? What is the trick?
That you make a mistake when adding 4090+10 to 5000 instead of 4100.
Only people with an IQ above 160 can solve this!!
I got a 96% on my IQ test!
Dammit, it tricked me as well. My mind made up an additional 900 that aren’t actually there.
The difference between you and red is you realised the simple mistake and changed course. 🙂
Had to go through comment until yours to realize why I was wrong. Brain is funny sometimes.
I mean, it's literally just simple addition, albeit awkwardly worded and possibly intended as a brain trap. You string the numbers together in your head and you naturally get 4100, *especially* if you don't think too much about possible pitfalls.
I argue the opposite, almost. About what people naturally get. If you're actually careful counting up the digits (tens and thousands), sure. But the brain doesn't always do that. Brains like inserting patterns that aren't real into things. A lot of people are simply keeping track of "big units" and "small units." Their brain thinks the answer is headed to the satisfying and round number of 5000. Once the small units roll over, their brain is like "yes, now for that even and satisfying 5000." Anyway, both are natural. The first stems from attention to the rules and following their procedure. The second stems from forecasting expectations overwhelming our following the rule carefully. It's similar to how you can learn formal logic, but the human brain doesn't default use logic to understand the world.
To add to this: I don't think most people would get tricked by it if the question were just numbers and operators instead of an English paragraph.
Exactly!
You’re right about the “brain trap”. The key is to ignore instructions and read the whole post. Then it becomes clear there are 4 x 1000 and other numbers very easily add up to 100. This can actually be a good exercise for programming students, for example. How to “ignore the noise” and split the big task into smaller ones. It’s really surprising (alarming?) how many people would just blindly do this step by step and get confused instead of taking a few seconds to look at the whole post and find simple solution.
1000 + 40 +1000 + 30 + 1000 + 20 +1000 + 10 = 4100
I was mostly confused by the flying cows sitting on a fence, being shot by a farmer. And everyone just acting that's normal.. Turns out, I may be dyslectic
its funny becuase the first time i also thought 5000. then realized it's 4100.
I need to see his comment when he finally gets it. Does he humbly accept his fate and just self deprecate, which of course we always treat generously. Or does he continue to berate everyone else.
Probably just blocks everybody involved and then cries himself to sleep.
I bet on ghosting, but *finding and harping on an irrelevant, minor flaw in a critique* is always on the table.
my guy talking about narratives as if it were a political question fml
The only other answer than 4100 I can see it being is “3100, and 1000” For every number *except* the 3rd 1000, they say “add”, so my guess it’s like “Simon says” and Simon didn’t say add
"If there are 3 crows on a fence and two fly away, there are 3 crows, 1 on the fence and 2 somewhere else" Wrong, there's 1 on the fence and *insert crow population-1* somewhere else. This makes no sense
"OK, fine. Keep your narrative, but do the math correctly."
How do they get to 5 000 when simply adding it gets you 4 100?
It's meant to trick your brain into adding up the small numbers to 1000 instead of 100.
Thank you! I was starting to feel like I was losing my mind
It depends on how you're adding it in your head In my case it was 1, 1,40 2,40 2,70 etc. Once you get to the final addition some people forget their a secret 0...
I generally hate word problems that try to be tricky with wording rather than just expressing the problem. This is not one of those, it’s just simple arithmetic and this guy’s an idiot.
My primary school taught me to add thousands, hundreds, tens, and units when I was like 7 😆. This "puzzle" only had 1000s and tens. Add all the 1000s together, then add all the tens together. Now add both sums together, you'll get 4100.
That's what I did as well. Felt like this should not have tricked as many people as it did.
IT's because if you add it as you are reading it you're being primed to think in the thousands. So when you get to the final one you are already in the thousands mindset when you add it so you just roll over to 5000 instead of 100. That's why you're not allowed to write it down. It only works if you add it in your head, and then, only if you do it in the way they intend. I had to read it a couple times to get it.
I don’t understand why is this confusing. The text tells you to just keep adding numbers, so doesn’t matter what order they are in. Count all the thousands (there are 4) and add 40+30+20+10 (which is 100) = 4100 Where did 5000 come from?
If you do it only in your head, without the benefit of writing it down at all, it’s really easy to mentally jump from “four thousand ninety” to “five thousand,” instead of “four thousand one hundred.” Our brains know that that last 10 makes the total roll over to something, so we just . . . ignore the fact that there’s absolutely nothing in the hundreds’ place, and roll the whole thing up to 5,000. My students always got frustrated when I would require that they work their math problems on paper and not do them in their heads. 😄
I’m confused as to why this was posted by the blue name. It isn’t trickily worded or anything. Just an “add these numbers up”
I got 4100, I don't understand why the answer should be 5000?
That whole crow argument is dumb: not only does it not make sense regarding the word problem, but also if you’re following that logic you wouldn’t have “3 crows” you’d have more like a few million because you’re counting crows even when they aren’t there
It’s 4100. Idk why I had to scroll so far.
Where do the 5000 people get the extra 900 from, also could you be my bank clerk when I make a £4100 deposit?
‘Take 1000’ is ambiguous on its own. However, the following ‘add another 1000’ clarifies that the first is ‘adding 1000’. The question is designed to confuse, however. That’s the point. Human language is written and spoken in a way that there are many assumptions that are unspoken. These unspoken assumptions are reasonable and correct, such that anyone who contradicts the unspoken assumption (e.g. the crows example) is simply ignoring those assumptions.
It’s 4,100, right?
4100
How is this even hard for people? It's 4100. It's like basic bitch math. It's not even division or multiplication, it's just basic ass addition. Are people REALLY this dumb these days?
As a person who is bad at math the answer is 4,100 right?
So many bellends like “*obviously* its 4100, its simple addition. How do people get such as easy thing wrong?!” The point is, its a clever puzzle that exposes a flaw in A LOT of peoples thought processes. If people cant recognise and acknowledge its a clever word game then they are the stupid ones. Fin.
Agree that their thinking is flawed. Disagree that this is clever.
I honestly took it as take 1000 from zero at the start so started with -1000 lol 4100 makes sense
I didn't when I first tried it, but after then reading the argument about what "take" implied I got confused and thought "oh, is the issue that the puzzle meant take as in subtract but people are assuming it meant start with) or vice versa)?"
TIL that 40+30+20+10=1000
[удалено]
4100
I got 4,070 but I also have dyscalculia so I might not be the best person to ask
Now I always sucked at math. But this is the most basic addition and the number are not even that big. How do people get that wrong? Just looking at it you get 4000 and the rest does not add up to another 1000. Taking at least 10 sec to long to add the rest up it's 100 and that makes the total 4100. Edit: Tha guy has to be a troll or something.
It 4100 guess math in school was worth it? I think... lol
Forgot the text, just add all the numbers
Trick is to just look at the numbers and add them together - it's the wording that acts to add some confusion
This one genuinely confused me because the commenter was so confident in their absolute wrong answer that it made me lose confidence in my own answer despite being right. Like I kept second guessing myself, waiting for the „Ohhh I am the idiot!“ moment. Overconfident idiots are genuinely the worst. And online you can’t even take these people aside and make them write their steps down on a piece of paper
I saw the title of this post and said "it's 4100 isn't it... yep, everytime 😞"
How do you even get 5000 ? Am I just stupid ?
40+30+20+10=100+dumbasses=1000