Question

Once upon a time there was an old man who owned a number of camels. He was considering giving the camels to members of his family and thought: “Perhaps I should let my two sons have the camels – no, there would be one camel left over. Perhaps I should divide the camels among all five of my children – no, there would be two camels left over. Perhaps I should share the camels among my 17 children and grandchildren – no, there would be 3 camels left over. I had better just keep the camels all for myself!” How many camels does the old man own?

Answer 1

would it be 23 assuming that each person in the last scenario gets 1 camel plus the 6 remaining camels? 17+6=23?

Answer 2

Let the number of camels be x,
when divided by 17, it leaves a remainder of 3,
so therefore x=17n+3, where n is a natural number
Also since the there is still one camel left when x is divided among two, it must be an ODD number
Thus the 'n' would be an even number, because odd into even will give u even and +3 will make it odd
so your possibilities can be n=2,4,6,8,....

Answer 3

At this point you can just manually check...

Answer 4

so there isn't just one definite answer?

Answer 5

Nope, there is, try one of the even values of n and see if it fits with the division among 5 people

Answer 6

so would I do 17*even number divided by 5?

Answer 7

Try the even values, whatever answer you get, divide it by 5, if u get the remainder as 2 then you have the answer

Answer 8

oh okay! so like 17*2+3/5?

Answer 9

For example
\[17 \times 6 +3=105\]\[105/5=21\]
remainder is not 2 in this case

Answer 10

oh i see! doing the math now!!

Answer 11

I havent gotten anything with R2 :o

Answer 12

17*2+3=37 37/5=7.4

Answer 13

and 2 is the smallest even number

Answer 14

How much is the remainder when 37 is divided by 5?You're telling me the quotient..(7.4)

Answer 15

OH DUH

Answer 16

I'm sorry I'm so slow, i was using a calculator instead of doing the math

Answer 17

its 7 R2

Answer 18

Yep, so 37 when divided among 2, everyone gets 18 camels while 1 is left over,
37 when divided among 5, everyone gets 7 camels while 2 are left over,
17 when divided among 17, everyone gets 2 camels while 3 are left over,
Is everything satisfied as per the question?See for yourself

Answer 19

wow that is so cool how we were able to get the number of camels just by that information! i felt like it was impossible! thank you so so much!! and thanks for being so patient :)

Answer 20

:)