A judge tells a condemned prisoner that he will be hanged at noon on one day in the following week but that the execution will be a surprise to the prisoner. He will not know the day of the hanging until the executioner knocks on his cell door at noon that day.
Having reflected on his sentence, the prisoner draws the conclusion that he will escape from the hanging. His reasoning is in several parts. He begins by concluding that if the hanging were on Friday then it would not be a surprise, since he would know by Thursday night that he was to be hanged the following day, as it would be the only day left (in that week). Since the judge's sentence stipulated that the hanging would be a surprise to him, he concludes it cannot occur on Friday.
He then reasons that the hanging cannot be on Thursday either, because that day would also not be a surprise. On Wednesday night he would know that, with two days left (one of which he already knows cannot be execution day), the hanging should be expected on the following day.
By similar reasoning he concludes that the hanging can also not occur on Wednesday, Tuesday or Monday. Joyfully he retires to his cell confident that the hanging will not occur at all.
The next week, the executioner knocks on the prisoner's door at noon on Wednesday — an utter surprise to him. Everything the judge said has come true.
my reasoning is this: assuming that the prisoner has reasoned out that he cannot be hanged, him being hanged on any given day would be a surprise. it might then be argued that the purpose of judge telling the prisoner that his hanging day would be a mystery is to induce this false sense of safety in the prisoner, so as to justify the hanging being a surprise. if the prisoner is paranoid, he would think that every day might be the day he dies, then there wouldnt be any surprise anymore. hence i would argue that the purpose of the judge telling the prisoner it would be a surprise is to heighten his expectation of reprieve and hence increase the level of surprise when he eventually is hanged. this follows from the knowledge that the prisoner is damned and there is no way the hanging will not take place. in other words, the prisoner has come to a false conclusion that contradicts prior knowledge of the fact that he is condemned to be hanged.
which means he is an idiot.
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