The 2 guards guarding snakes and gold

[vclark]

There are 2 doors and 2 immortal guards. 1 is guarding a room full with gold and the other 1 is guarding a room full of poisonus snakes. 1 of the guards always lies and the other always tells the truth.(you dont know who is the liar) You want to find out where the gold is. You may ask 1 question to 1 guard. What is the question ?

[saintpeter48]

the question to either guard is, are you the guard that lies.

[mibn2cweus]

Are you guarding both snakes and gold?

[Dsg]

You ask one guard:

"If I asked the other guard if he was guarding the gold - what would he say ?"

Answer : "Yes" - choose the room guarded by the one who you asked or "No" - choose the other room

[mibn2cweus]

Dsg, Thanks!
I�ve been so humiliated by the lack of resolution offered by my guess and am now equally relieved to finally know the solution to vclark�s excellent riddle.

[nightmare]

A similar puzzle is where you come to a fork in a path through the jungle.There are two local tribes, one of which is friendly, the other ,hostile and cannibalistic.
The cannibals always lie, and the other people always tell the truth. They are indistinguishable fron one another.
The two paths lead to each of their villages.
At the fork is a local tribesman, but you cannot tell if he is hostile or not.
The same answer applies to find the correct way to go, but in this case, what is the much simpler question you can ask ?

[mibn2cweus]

"Which path leads to your tribe?"

[Tedecc]

The simplest question is surely: "Which way would the other guy say leads to the gold (friendly tribe)."

You then take the other route.

Reasoning:

1. You are speaking to the liar. The other guy would tell the truth and name the safe route, however you are speaking to the liar who would lie about what the good guy said and therefore direct you to the dangerous route.

2. You are speaking to the good guy who would correctly report the other guy's answer, which would be a lie and would be directing you to the dangerous root.

In each case you are directed to the dangerous route - you take the other on.

[mibn2cweus]

Asking either a friendly (truthful) or hostile (lying) tribesman, "Which path leads to your tribe?", they will designate the path leading to the friendly tribe.

[NewDazzler]

Just tie them both up and have a look, they're immortal, not unbeatable.

[pigeon toes]

are you awake? If he says yes then he's telling the truth. If he says no. then obviously he is lying.

[pigeon toes]

Ignore my answer. i read the q wrong!