Sandy Wood
Brain Game: Ring My Bell
by Sandy Wood - August 5, 2009 - 7:30 AM

bloghead_braingames.jpg

Well, it’s hump day, and I’m a sure ’nuff Quasimodo. So get back, Loretta, and enjoy today’s Brain Game:

What’s the final number in this sequence?

6, 6, 7, 9, 8, 6, ?

Here is the SOLUTION.
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Comments (8)

  1. Hey I got one.

    posted by Bill on 8-5-2009 at 8:42 am

  2. Darn, i was viewing the numbers as if they were displayed as a palindrome.

    6, 6, 7, 9, 8, 6, ?.
    0, 1, 2,-1,-2,-1. and my mind added another 0.

    my sequence being 6,6,7,9,8,6,5,5
    Way off! lol

    posted by Steven on 8-5-2009 at 8:53 am

  3. Oh, Sandy, how I love your random references to literature by Victor Hugo and Beatles songs.

    Nice puzzle, too.

    posted by Allison on 8-5-2009 at 9:22 am

  4. Could also be the number plus 0 (6, 6) plus 1 (7) plus 2 (9) minus 1 (8) minus 2 (6) so the next number would be minus 3 or maybe minus 0

    posted by HJackson on 8-5-2009 at 10:46 am

  5. Steven, I was thinking the exact same.

    posted by Marty on 8-5-2009 at 10:46 am

  6. 42.

    With x being a given number on the list, and y being the next number on the list, the sequence is generated by the polynomial formula:

    y = ((7/90)x^6)-((67/40)x^5)+((257/18)x^4)-((1471/24)x^3)+((6239/45)x^2)-(4621/30x)+70

    posted by gmsc on 8-6-2009 at 3:44 pm

  7. I, like Steven, thought it was a numerical palindrome. These number games should only have one logical solution. And, I must say, that the solution put forth is much more illogical than the one most here came up with.

    Sorry, I usually like the Brain Games, but this one just seemed cheap and forced.

    posted by Cory on 8-6-2009 at 6:14 pm

  8. Steven’s answer would work, except I asked for the final number in the sequence — not numbers. His palindrome solution required two answers (5, and then another 5) when we needed only one.

    And Cory, there are almost always multiple answers to these types of problems unless the “correct” answer is overly obvious. There’s no way to determine in what direction people’s minds will go, and there’s no way to tell ALL the possible ways at which a solution might be arrived. In this case, I presumed that since the final answer was the seventh in the sequence, that most readers’ minds would think of a seven-day week and then figure it out.

    Having said that, I’ve always welcomed alternate Brain Game answers that can be considered correct. If you solve the problem, and follow the rules, then your answer is correct even if it doesn’t match mine. The point of the Brain Game is not to be right or wrong, but just to exercise the old noggin.

    posted by Sandy Wood on 8-6-2009 at 11:18 pm

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