Contributions
Comments, suggestions, solutions to my 'posers' and just about anything else that's on your mind...
Solutions to Issue One's poser, 'The Magic Rectangle.'
One possibility
Canadian artist Wildago has kindly offered this intriguing suggestion:
"I believe the solution is my uncle Beryl from Pennsylvania, infamous for hiding one piece of every jigsaw puzzle. His reach also extended to magic rectangles, red crayons and Ikea assembly packs."
An attractive idea, but I can't help thinking there's a bit more to it than this...
Another...
Well, I've learnt something. I've learnt that solutions to posers are a bit like buses: you wait ages for one and then two come along at the same time. For the first one I actually got the ball rolling myself. I remembered that Gustavo, one of my Twitter followers/followees (@gustavojmata) was 'a former physicist' with 'a bent for analytical and philosophical thinking.' I decided he was the man for the job and so I sent him a tweet. He responded quick as a flash with the following:
"Pehaps you are referring to the Missing Square puzzle. You can find it described in Wikipedia here..." And lo and behold- there it was:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missing_square_puzzle
Complete with groovy moving diagrams, the lot. Give that man a Nobel Prize!
The other variation of the solution came from a rather more 'tangential' direction, in the form of an unexpected e-mail from feisty French twitteuse, @Brindille_ Actually, I don't know why I was surprised- Brindille and I go back a long way. All the way back to the beginning of my Twitter timeline, in fact. And she's been running rings round me ever since...
Brindille says the solution was demonstrated by American mathematican Sam Loyd, and attached the following diagram:
Haven't got my head round it yet, but I'm sure I will in the fullness of time. I'd better, otherwise that minx Brindille will never let me hear the last of it...
Anyway, the main thing is- people have sent me, or rather us, the solution. Thank you, I really appreciate it. I'm always happy to receive contributions and suggestions of any kind. Please keep 'em coming!