Simple puzzle is exposing how terrible everyone is at math

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By VT

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Maths wasn't exactly my favorite subject at school, but I'd like to think that I've got the basics down and can function as a reasonably adept human in the counting department.

But now one simple maths puzzle on Twitter is exposing how terrible most of us are at maths.

It was tweeted by journalist Jitesh Pillai and while it's not exactly taking people back to their trigonometry days, it is showing that most of us could do with taking on a refresher course on the basics.

He tweeted the puzzle which asks 'How many triangles?' with the caption: "Say?"

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/jiteshpillaai/status/983280254872584192]]

Now, on a first glance, this puzzle looks simple enough: there's one big triangle with a lot of smaller triangles inside it, but then you realize that they make up even more triangles and before long you're well and truly stumped.

Since it was posted on April 9, 2018, the tweet has received a whopping 3.5K comments from people who are confident that they know the answer.

One tweet which has received over 900 likes shows its user's working and reads: "24 is right answer."

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/Digamber/status/983306823703736321]]

Another confidently said: "4! How is this an issue? A triangle has 3 (tri) corners... Never 4 corners."

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/Calitraci/status/983362154920210434]]

A third answered: "I see 12 or maybe more!"

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/UFStemCell/status/983367962215305219]]

A fourth wrote: "I've got 15 so far..."

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/joycie01/status/983370281371815936]]

Meanwhile, a fifth Twitter user shared their working and wrote: "And [the] answer is 18."

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/onlyproudindian/status/983296633701093377]]

However, one user who showed their working and concluded that the answer was 18 was challenged by another who wrote: "Many more triangles present in your drawing. Should have used a blank page."

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/Patrick38749435/status/983460983686483969]]

So, what the is the answer? I hear you beg.

Well, it turns out that the answer actually is 18. Well done if you were smart enough to get it right. I certainly wasn't!

However, this is not the only puzzle that's recently left the people of Twitter scratching their heads, and the CIA also put users to the test by asking them to guess what time it is in this photograph.

Alongside the picture of a snowed town, they wrote: "Put your analysis skills to the test" and gave social media users three possible options: 3:00PM, 11:00AM, or 7:00AM.

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/CIA/status/1333811214812581890]]

The CIA followed up the initial tweet by revealing that the correct answer is 7 am.

"Most of you guessed correctly," the CIA wrote. "Seems like you all have an eye for this. You should check out our careers page: cia.gov/careers/ #DiscovertheCIA"

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/CIA/status/1333876644516425728]]

What did you guess?

Simple puzzle is exposing how terrible everyone is at math

vt-author-image

By VT

Article saved!Article saved!

Maths wasn't exactly my favorite subject at school, but I'd like to think that I've got the basics down and can function as a reasonably adept human in the counting department.

But now one simple maths puzzle on Twitter is exposing how terrible most of us are at maths.

It was tweeted by journalist Jitesh Pillai and while it's not exactly taking people back to their trigonometry days, it is showing that most of us could do with taking on a refresher course on the basics.

He tweeted the puzzle which asks 'How many triangles?' with the caption: "Say?"

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/jiteshpillaai/status/983280254872584192]]

Now, on a first glance, this puzzle looks simple enough: there's one big triangle with a lot of smaller triangles inside it, but then you realize that they make up even more triangles and before long you're well and truly stumped.

Since it was posted on April 9, 2018, the tweet has received a whopping 3.5K comments from people who are confident that they know the answer.

One tweet which has received over 900 likes shows its user's working and reads: "24 is right answer."

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/Digamber/status/983306823703736321]]

Another confidently said: "4! How is this an issue? A triangle has 3 (tri) corners... Never 4 corners."

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/Calitraci/status/983362154920210434]]

A third answered: "I see 12 or maybe more!"

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/UFStemCell/status/983367962215305219]]

A fourth wrote: "I've got 15 so far..."

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/joycie01/status/983370281371815936]]

Meanwhile, a fifth Twitter user shared their working and wrote: "And [the] answer is 18."

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/onlyproudindian/status/983296633701093377]]

However, one user who showed their working and concluded that the answer was 18 was challenged by another who wrote: "Many more triangles present in your drawing. Should have used a blank page."

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/Patrick38749435/status/983460983686483969]]

So, what the is the answer? I hear you beg.

Well, it turns out that the answer actually is 18. Well done if you were smart enough to get it right. I certainly wasn't!

However, this is not the only puzzle that's recently left the people of Twitter scratching their heads, and the CIA also put users to the test by asking them to guess what time it is in this photograph.

Alongside the picture of a snowed town, they wrote: "Put your analysis skills to the test" and gave social media users three possible options: 3:00PM, 11:00AM, or 7:00AM.

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/CIA/status/1333811214812581890]]

The CIA followed up the initial tweet by revealing that the correct answer is 7 am.

"Most of you guessed correctly," the CIA wrote. "Seems like you all have an eye for this. You should check out our careers page: cia.gov/careers/ #DiscovertheCIA"

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/CIA/status/1333876644516425728]]

What did you guess?