How did it all begin, and not begin? Will it, in effect, happen more than once?
And can you tell me how it all ends? Or is that an indefinite article.
All I know is it surrounds that, and it makes me subjective.
Are you surprised? Maybe this is the sound you make when you start knowing things.
This is a series of mini-riddles. "it all" begins with an i, and "not" begins with an n. f appears more than once in "effect". "it all" ends with an l. a is an indefinite article. t surrounds "that". i is the subjective form of "me". o is a statement of surprise. n is the sound at the beginning of "knowing things" (because the k is silent). Together these letters form the answer: inflation.
Believing you may have discovered a planet harbouring alien intelligence, you transmit a series of questions towards it. You are startled to recieve several answers in a cryptic language!
| Is anyone there? | yes |
| Are you alive? | we are alive |
| What is a prime number? | nineteen for example |
| Is nine million, three hundred and twenty two thousand, five hundred and fifty one a prime number? | no |
| Is light quick or slow? | quick |
| How did the universe begin? | with a bang |
| Do you know about quantum mechanics? | of course |
| How do black holes work? | no idea |
| What is your favourite human novel? | rendezvous with rama |
| What about your favourite human movie? | extraterrestrial |
| Should we be afraid of you? | we come in peace |
| Are you afraid of us? | you must be joking |
| What is the answer to this puzzle? | selfaware |
| a | b | c | d | e | f | g | h | i | j | k | l | m | n | o | p | q | r | s | t | u | v | w | x | y | z |
Ae Ba Bh CfDe
Al Fe YTe
31 u 28 re 31 r 30 r
Do Do Re Do FaMi
s t e p h en
d n e e e e h e se
Your second hand time machine is controlled by a keypad, and has a directory of years pasted on the side. You decide to go on a temporal joyride. Starting in 2018, you travel one year back and then seven years forward. You speed three decades into the future, then half a century into the past, and then two decades back into the future. You go two years hither, then six decades hence. Finally you go back a whole century, before returning to where you started. At once, you realise the answer.
| 1 | 2 | 3 |
| 4 | 5 | 6 |
| 7 | 8 | 9 |
| * | 0 | # |
The search for the answer in the last days of Earth:
Final transmission from Survival Base 36.
calibrating........
1/3 = 0.33333333....
1/6 = 0.16666666....
1/7 = 0.14285714....
4/9 = 0.44444444....
calibrated.
we believe we have found the answer at coordinates 77329518556564 by 101559956668415.
additionally:
reporting a discovery of MAGNESIUM at coordinates 3309700194202 by 5345260877285.
reporting a discovery of CANE SUGAR at coordinates 6937584300135 by 20311991333683.
a fresh supply of WATER has been found at coordinates 7750341 by 8638025.
reporting a discovery of SEEDS at coordinates 47701072 by 60466175.
reporting a discovery of a large cache of ROCKET FUEL at coordinates 2810810269416621 by 3656158440062975.
Transmission ends.
If you divide the first coordinate by the second coordinate, and then convert to base 36, in each case you get a number with a repeating word after the decimal point. For example, for the MAGNESIUM coordinates you get:
| = in base 36 |
Feel free to change the numbers in the fraction and see what the base 36 result is! If you use the coordinates given for the answer, you get 0.resourcesresou..., so the answer is resources.
Only a hyperintelligent robot could solve this puzzle. Luckily, you have designed just such a robot. But someone has put all of the submodules on the main circuit board in the wrong positions: