I found this puzzle while cruising the Internet today.

A sultan has granted a commoner a chance to marry one of his N daughters. The commoner will be presented with the daughters one at a time and, when each daughter is presented, the commoner will be told the daughter’s dowry (which is fixed in advance). Upon being presented with a daughter, the commoner must immediately decide whether to accept or reject her (he is not allowed to return to a previously rejected daughter). However, the sultan will allow the marriage to take place only if the commoner picks the daughter with the overall highest dowry. Then what is the commoner’s best strategy, assuming he knows nothing about the distribution of dowries?

Click here for the answer

This is a cool problem because forms of it occur all the time, the classic example being dating/marriage like in this puzzle, but its applicability is definitely not limited to just that. The strategy indicated in the solution is itself not that surprising because I think that’s what most of us do, or least I do, most of the time–that is after a while we pick something. The real question being how long do you wait to pick? What I found surprising is how long to wait under the optimal strategy, and that it’s (only or incredibly) 37% likely to produce the best result. So the bottom line is don’t stress about this kind of problem the next time you encounter it, because there really is no perfect solution and not one that “works” more than 37% of the time anyway.

To totally show off today, I am posting my second video blog entry. My friend Gary took this yesterday when I completed my 2nd skydive, and I “stuck” the landing! The first time you skydive you can say it was for the once in a life-time experience and choose to never do it again. I did it again, so who knows, maybe I am crazy!?

My second freefall also flew by and it seemed like maybe 10.5 rather than 10 seconds like the first one. In real-time, you freefall for almost 1 minute. I am told this feeling of time compression is normal. This still makes skydiving probably one of the most expensive sports/thrills when you calculate it by the hour. For me at this level, the really fun part is flying the canopy. I will let the video speak for itself. Click here to view video

I am hosting a party on Friday, March 10th in Mountain View, CA to celebrate the conclusion of my divorce, and the beginning of my new life. Please join me to have a drink. RSVP as soon as you can to let me know if you will attend. You can RSVP here at eVite.com.