Tomorrow’s Conundrum will be a new genre of puzzle for the blog, and I just wanted to lay out the rules ahead of time and offer a sample puzzle to make it clear for everyone how a Venn Diagram puzzle works.

In a Venn Diagram puzzle, there are three overlapping circles, marked A, B, and C. Each circle has a different rule about who or what can go inside. The challenge is to guess the rule for each circle by looking at the items inside and outside of that circle. Think of it as three mini-picnic puzzles. Whenever I can, I’ll make the three rules vary in difficulty, for a three-layered challenge.

All four of the items inside each circle will have something in common, but the four items outside of that circle do not necessarily have anything in common, other than not belonging in the circle. Some items will be in more than one circle, and so, fit the rules of all of the circles they’re in. In the example below, Bill Clinton fits all three rules, while William Shakespeare fits none of the three rules. Sir Ian McKellen fits the rule for Circle A, but not for Circle B or Circle C, and so on.

Have you figured out one of the rules? Two? All three? Feel free to post whatever you’ve got in the comments below. Just tell us which circle you’re solving, and what the rule is.

Remember, this is a sample puzzle to get you familiar with the genre. The real Conundrum for the week, another Venn Diagram puzzle, will posted tomorrow.

Enjoy!

UPDATE: Cirlces A, B, and C solved by Kenneth W. Davis. See comments for answers.

This entry was posted on Monday, February 19th, 2007 at 7:28 pm and is filed under Conundrum, Venn. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.