Very fun! I really like the "Uncommon knowledge about..." addenda, where, for example, it reported its belief that the sun is an insect, paper clips are used in Oriental cooking, etc. "It taint what you don't know, but what you know that taint so." --Mark Twain (supposedly)
MCKAY@vax2.concordia.ca wrote: What if you know that at most k of the answers may be wrong?
Another variant: this weekend I (foolishly) tried to impress my son by guessing his number from 1..100 in <=7 queries. After "50?-Less", "25?-Less" he said "This is boring. If I give you the same answer 3 times in a row you lose." Now what's the best strategy? Eg after 50?-Less should I guess 25? with a 50% chance of being forced to guess 1? next, or would it be better to guess, say, 12? next, skewing the interval search in return for a better chance of avoiding the probably-wasted forced guess? Given an optimal Guesser, what numbers are the Hider's best choices? (Perhaps posed as casino games: ante $1, the house pays $100 for a hit on the first guess, then reduces the payoff by half (rounded down) each time it answers...)