Question of Logic Scene - Kaspar Hauser

[TheUselessEfforts]

There is actually a much simpler solution:

Pointing in one direction, one may ask "Is that the village where the other guy lives?"

Truthful villager:

a) YES --> that's the liars' village

b) NO --> that's the truth-tellers' village

Liar villager:

a) YES [NO] --> that's the liars' village

b) NO [YES] --> that's the truth-tellers' village

If any of the villagers anwsers "yes", then it's the liars' village, otherwise it's the truth-tellers' one.

[bigstinkyboat]

too bad the real Kaspar was a fraud.

[AAAAAAAAAUUUURGH]

Why not ask: Do you come from any of villages by the crossroads?

Is this not a solution based on logic?

[Floorsnarl]

Following my response to gorramdoll:The liar is simply lying about what he would answer if asked--"Would you answer no if I were to ask you whether you came from the liars' village?"He would answer no. But if he were honest,he would say,"Yes,I would answer no."But since he's a liar,he answers no, as in,I would answer no if you asked me whether I would answer no if asked whether I came from the liars' village.So,he's lying about what he would answer.Took me forever to realize this...

[Floorsnarl]

The answer does make sense in the context of the argument; but, admittedly, there are some implicit premises: we must assume that the liar always lies and does not veer back and forth, telling the truth one second and a lie the next. If the truth-teller answered yes, then he would be a proven truth-teller.

IMPORTANT: If the liar said no, then that means he would've answered yes when asked if he was from the liars' village.

[gorramdoll]

I don't understand the professor's answer. wouldn't someone from the liar's village and someone from the truthteller's village both say that they didn't come from the liar's village?

[Floorsnarl]

@gorramdoll If the liar was asked if he came from the liars' village he would lie and answer no. If the liar was asked if he came from the truth-tellers' village, he would lie and answer yes.The trick is the double-negative.Like in math when 2 negative numbers are multiplied the product becomes positive.The question is "Would you answer no if asked whether you came from the liars' village?" Assuming that the liar always lies, he would answer no.The construction forces him to reveal his identity.

[gorramdoll]

@Floorsnarl Thanks

[diangle]

R.I.P. Bruno S. The Crazy artist who played the role of Kaspar Hauser died a few days a go....

[garvic7]

i love hearing Herzog talk about movies more tha the movies themselves -- which tend to be poorly constructed for the most part.

[TheHelgeW]

scrutograph: As srhays says, if the liar pretends to be another animal and then denies being a tree-frog, he will be telling a truth.

[vincentmercutio]

I love this film! I love the story about Kaspar Hauser and I think in this movie everybody was working on it wanted to tell the story and nothing else. Additionally the movie has been shot in my hometown Dinkelsbühl. Simply epic...

[shadedness]

¿Ah, verdad? Ve un problema de hablar una lengua extranjera. Un saludo. Esta película es genial, y hace mucho que no la he vuelto a ver.

[CheeseBubbles]

One of the best movies I have ever seen!

[dadoX1000]

@CheeseBubbles that mean you seen few movies

[chicoriagrande]

his reaction when the professor says thats not a valid question is amazing,

[icnclt]

lustig, wenn Sie Ihr Gesicht wird Kasper 3:58

[ljubicastimarker]

cool

[terminaldeity]

I love this film, and this scene especially. What I got out of it was that Kaspar was far more logical than anyone else. You could ask any number of questions in this instance.

[simhon007]

I would ask him the date and time... If he lies cause he has too... I would know

[srhays]

Are ye daft or jokin' mate? You've got this video favorited... The reason this film is so great is BECAUSE it's ordinary. It's called minimalism. The film doesn't try to "win people over" with fancy editing or "forced" gimmicks. It doesn't pretend to be hot-shit or cutting-edge or whatever. It is what it is. A simple, naturalistic, surrealistic film. Imperfect, humble, ascetic, truthful - clearly it has a message. It's not aimless, chaotic, pretentious "artsy-fartsy" shite...

[blackfootnawaho]

this film is hot shit! i watch this video over and over and over :D

[comsunjava]

There's something about Herzog's films that are .. mesmerizing. Don't know how to put it. I'm not even sure what is going on in Aquirre, but somehow it's a fascinating movie. And from this film, Kaspar Hauser, there's an "enigmatic" scene where Florian Fricke plays Agnus Dei, somehow Herzog captures Fricke's brilliance.

[dadoX1000]

@srhays nigga plz

[FilmTraum9c]

Grossartiger Film.Manchmal sieht man vor lauter Baeume nicht den Wald!

[Celestiaetterra]

One must view this film in its historical context. 19th century Romanticists were the first hippies. Just as 60s hippies were reaction against 40s and 50s, this was what the Romanticists were rebelling against.

[ashburnhouse]

This film has nothing to do with Romanticism.

[Celestiaetterra]

Romanticism - "A movement in literature, music, and painting in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Romanticism has often been called a rebellion against an overemphasis on reason in the arts. It stressed the essential goodness of human beings, celebrated nature rather than civilization, and valued emotion and imagination over reason."

Now do you see?

[ashburnhouse]

I have been studying Romanticism for four years at uoft, so I know what it is. This film has nothing to do with it. Herzog even refers to himself as anti-Romantic in the commentary to "Heart of Glass."

[comsunjava]

Interesting point, because Georg Büchner (German Romantic) is one of Herzog's influences of course, and he made a film based on one of his plays-Woyzeck.

This is actually a humorous clip, Herzog's certainly poking fun at the Rationalists (as represented by the Professor of Logic) with the Professor of Logic and Mathematics "hab ich nicht Verstehen gelernt sondern da hab ich Schliessen gelernt" ;)

[Roxolan]

The reason this simple question was possible is that the enigma is badly phrased. In the most popular version, what you have to discover is not the origin of the man, but directions (or any other thing that you expect the man to know).

This way, if you ask him if he's a frog, you'd know whether he was a liar or not, but not the information you seek, and you'd have wasted your question.

[hognoxious]

To get the information, you just have to ask "Did that hurt?".

After kicking him, repeatedly if necessary, in the nuts.

[atraub]

@Roxolan

if you sought the village of truth, you need only ask 'Which of these two paths lead to your village?"

If you sought the village of liars, you need only ask the previous question, and take the other route.

[Roxolan]

@atraub

That would also be too easy an enigma. The information to acquire must be something known by both men but not directly related to either.

[atraub]

@Roxolan

So, what might be a good question?

[Roxolan]

@atraub

The usual form of this puzzle is this:

You are in a room with two doors. One of them is the way to freedom, while the other leads to certain death. Next to the door are two guards. One of them always lie, while the other always tells the truth. You do not know which is the right door or the truthful guard. You may ask a single question to one of the guards. What do you ask?

The answer is similar to the one given by the logician in the video (and no "frog" loopholes this time).

[masterbrum]

In fact there is another question!

The question could be, would you tell me yes if I asked you whether you came from the village of truth!

If he was from the truth place he would say yes, but if he came from the village of lie he would deny it!

Both, Double negative and Double Positive would work the same way!

So there are two answers to this puzzle!

[KasparHauser4]

You know this exact same thing happened to me at about the age of 14 in my old neighborhood. It's uncanny. The exact same logical puzzle and almost the same response from me as from Kaspar in the video.... and almost the EXACT same dismissive attitude by my questioneer.

[gabinmedeglia]

puro genio

[blackfoliage1]

My favourite film from Herzog.

[blackfootnawaho]

no question!

[searby]

thank you. one of my favourite films and one of my favourite scenes.

[nosferaturr]

Quel grand film et quelle grande scène !

What a great movie and grest scene !

[FabMike]

ich versteh die antwort vom professor garnicht, kann mir das wer mal erklärn?^^

[blackfootnawaho]

weil hier alle professoren sind wirst du keine antwort kriegen ;)

[jefferyklassen]

good movie, thanks for posting. I say:ask the person "Does 1 + 1 = 2?" I love how herzog makes the logician go "NOO! description is not deduction. In Logic and Math we do not understand things..." But all these question are subject to what the liars and truthers actually believe themselves. Maybe the liar believed he was a tree frog.

[scrutograph]

To ask whether they are frogs is not a solution, because the liar can pretend to be some other animal, and say "No", as well.

[srhays]

I see what you're saying, but assuming the solution is a yes/no question only, and assuming the liar will ALWAYS tell a lie, then the tree frog question makes sense. Regardless of what the liar thinks, if he only answered "are you a tree frog" with "no", then that much is true, & he wouldn't really be lying, so he wouldn't be a true 'liar' would he? But I think the whole point of the scene is to show that Kaspar is indeed fully capable of thinking for himself. That's the truly remarkable thing.

[scrutograph]

:-)

Another commentator says the scene shows the complete unwordlyness of Kaspar...

[BushHatesMe]

@scrutograph Agree with srhays. If you give the liar room to weasel out of a yes/no question, then you give the liar room to say something like "I don't know" when confronted with the original question, or to answer truthfully to it to use further deceit. Both solutions work under the original assumptions.

[HansBeimler]

@scrutograph

well then, why not ask: "are you a human?"

:D

[scrutograph]

One has to ask whether they are human beings.

Der liar will deny it.

[scrutograph]

Man müsste sie fragen, ob sie Menschen sind.

Der Mensch aus dem Lügnerdorf würde verneinen, der Mensch aus dem Wahrheitsdorf würde bejahen.

[ssfsx17]

Kaspar gave the same kind of answer that I was thinking of. Those "thinkers" from the 1800's sure were silly people.

[mannyv]

that guy's a wanker, go Kaspar! i love this film so much. can i make a requst? i no longer have the DVD, could you put up the scene at the start wth the boat on the pond and Mozart's "Dies Bildnis ist bezaubernd schön" plays? herzog is the absolut schitt.

[srhays]

Sorry Manny, I don't own the movie or else I would. I recorded this scene and another scene off of a VHS (if ya couldn't tell) from my school library, just for the hell of it. Someday soon I plan on ordering the DVD (I'm dying to see this in WS) so maybe I'll upload it then.... What happened to "your" DVD copy if I may ask?

Oh, and I dunno if you were being cute, but 'shit' in German is actually spelled "scheiße". Werner Herzog ist die Scheiße. Not sure if it means the same though!

[mannyv]

haha i was being cute, and i don't think "herzog ist die scheisze" mean the same thing lol. darn, that would've been really cool!

i lied, i never owned the DVD, i stole it off my sister and she fiiiinally claimed it back. just gotta get round to getting it for myself.

thanks for the upload anyway though!

[christophmahler]

Thanks for loading this up !