a monkey and his owner have collected 5000 coconuts. they want to sell their coconuts in the nearby city 1500 miles away. the monkey is going to travel across the oasis carrying as many coconuts as he can to the other side. (his owner must stay behind and guard the coconuts.) the monkey is fiercely strong and can carry 1000 coconuts at a time. however he eats one coconut every mile. what is the maximum number of coconuts the monkey can get across the oasis? how does the monkey do it? explain in detail how you arrived to your answer. hint: the monkey does not have to go all the way across the oasis in one trip.
Answers
Given that owner is guarding means he is not carrying the coconuts as per given information.
Monkey can carry 1000 coconuts at a time
So number of coconuts in the boat = 1000
Monkey eats 1 cocunut every mile
Number of miles = 1500
Then number of cocunuts needed by monkey to eat on the boat during first trip = 1500
Number of cocunts recieved on the other side = 1000-1500= -500
-500 is negative means monkey will eat up all the cocunts that are on the boat.
Hence final answer is the monkey can't carry any coconut across the oasis as he eats up all the coconuts during travel.
Since the money don’t have to carry all the coconut at once then he can take 1000 coconut for the first time, that will means that after 500 miles he only has 500 coconuts, he can keep them there and run back collect 1000 more when he will come back to the original place then he will be left with 500 and total 1000.
Then he can again go back and can take 1000 more then he will be left with total of 1500 on his last trip.
Then he can start moving ahead for 500 miles more then he will be left with 500 only, he can come back to collect the last piece of the 500 then he can go across and he will be left with 500.
Out of 5000 2000 are over, the owner and him can come back for the last 20000 where monkey will have 1500 left with 500 only.
The total of 1000 coconut will be sold.