Brain Workout

Challenging and intriguing puzzles to sharpen your mind, improve your memory, and keep your brain fit.

Marcel Danesi, Ph.D., is a professor of semiotics and anthropology at Victoria College, University of Toronto. His books include The Puzzle Instinct and The Total Brain Workout. See full bio

March 30, 2009, Neuroscience

Comments on "Can you solve these visual thinking puzzles?"

Can you solve these visual thinking puzzles?

By Marcel Danesi, Ph.D. on March 30, 2009 in Brain Workout

Visual thinking is the term used commonly in psychology to refer to the type of thinking that results from perceiving or processing visual stimuli, forms, or patterns. Such thinking is a major function of the right hemisphere of the brain, also known (logically enough) as the "visual hemisphere." Read More

Answer to puzzles

Submitted by Rajeev on March 31, 2009 - 5:42am.

I think there is faster way to reach the answer. Divide the area into three different sections

Area 1 - 1,2,4,5
Area 2 - 3,6,7
Area 3 - 8,9

These are standard areas with standard answers. Nothing unique here. i.e. no special calculation required here.

Area 1 configuration always has 10
Area 2 configuration always has 7
Area 3 configuration always has 3

Now since Area 2 and Area 3 have collinear end-points, consider these together to yield 3 more boxes.

Total 23

The key is to divide the problem into "known" pieces with standard answers.

Feel free to email me at rajeev.b.kulkarni@gmail.com

Visual Puzzles

Submitted by Marcel Danesi on May 22, 2009 - 5:27am.

Thanks for this truly insightful answer. What this shows me is that there is always a different and, in your case more elegant, way to skin a puzzle cat--pardon my extended metaphor. I believe that whole idea behind doing puzzles is to generate this kind of "mind stuff". It makes life interesting.

Thanks.

What did the first puzzle ask for?

Submitted by Anonymous on July 25, 2009 - 11:39am.

The first puzzle in your post asks:

"How many four-sided sided 900 figures (squares and rectangles) do you see in the diagram below?"

I don't even understand the question. What are "four-sided sided 900 figures"? How do they relate to squares and rectangles? Is it just a misprint? Is the puzzle simply how many squares and rectangles do we see?

There was a typo, the "900"

Submitted by Marcel Danesi on July 27, 2009 - 4:35am.

There was a typo, the "900" should be "90 degrees." Sorry.

For puzzle number 2: the

Submitted by Anonymous on July 25, 2009 - 11:56am.

For puzzle number 2: the triangles marked 2, 6, 4, and 9 are not complete triangles. The figures are not closed.

Fix the drawing.

All these puzzles did was raise my frustration level.

They also raised mine in

Submitted by Marcel Danesi on July 27, 2009 - 4:37am.

They also raised mine in making them. Drawing on a computer for me is still a problem. By the way, frustration is something that puzzles produce and it is in answer to why this is so that I have been devoting hours of research along with my students.

Thanks.