Solutions: 4, 3, 2, 1, and maybe (())
June 6, 2007 pm30 11:52 pm
The Four fours puzzle is famous. I learned the annual variation (edition 2007) from Denise, and that was fun.
Every once in a while I try another variation, and here’s todays. Use 4, 3, 2, 1 in exactly that order, and combine them with +, -, * and /, not necessarily in that order. (operations may be repeated, parentheses may be inserted). How many distinct numbers can you create?
Before you start, quiz yourself:
- How many do you expect to get?
- What percentage do you expect to be negative?
- What percentage do you expect not to be integers?
- And of the integers, what percent do you expect to be even?
Use the comments section, below, to discuss the actual answers. Click here for questions and general comments.
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JD2718 
I’ve written some Haskell code to solve this puzzle, which I’ve posted on my new personal blog (as distinct from The Math Less Traveled which I use just for math education stuff). Without using – as unary negation (which I think is the more interesting case) I get 52 distinct results; 8 are negative, 28 integers, and of those 14 are even.