I had promised an answer for my last riddle (Dec 10, 2006) and dutifully I should keep it. My apologies for not posting it earlier but hey... I said "stay tuned for the answer" and did not mention "soon" anywhere in that sentence. Haha, okay all right, here it is.
The court jester should reply that he is going to get beheaded. Think about it. If he gets beheaded, his statement becomes true but he should only get beheaded if his statement is false according to the king's conditions. Whereas if he gets hanged, his statement becomes false which must not happen because he ought to be hanged only if his statement is true. Either way there is a problem.
Hence, for the king to avoid himself from getting contradicted and reward the man for his timely wit, the king releases him. There you go.
All right, another riddle (I like doing this).
Imagine being locked up in a cell. There is an unbarred window high up in the cell. Jumping up does not help to reach the window. Tunneling out will take too long a time. Considering that the window and tunneling are the only two options available to escape, how will you go about doing it?
