How many minutes are there in February 2017?
This is "puzzling golf". The shortest correct answer wins.
PS: The puzzle is not so much to compute the result, but rather to express it in fewer than 5 digits.
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$\begingroup$ Please do not use tags that don't exist unless you're really sure that they need to be created. $\endgroup$– Deusovi ♦Feb 17, 2017 at 16:04
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$\begingroup$ Sorry. The tags were accepted by SE so I thought they existed. $\endgroup$– Florian FFeb 17, 2017 at 16:07
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$\begingroup$ To downvoters: don't forget to revise your vote when you have seen the answer. $\endgroup$– Florian FFeb 17, 2017 at 16:21
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1$\begingroup$ @FlorianF Once you hit 300 rep you can create tags $\endgroup$– David StarkeyFeb 17, 2017 at 18:01
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4 Answers
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As pointed out, there are
28 days x 24 hours x 60 minutes = 40,320 minutes in February 2017.
This can be expressed as:
(4x7) days x (3x8) hours x (1x2x5x6) minutes = 8! minutes.
answered Feb 17, 2017 at 16:26
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$\begingroup$ Correct! And I decided to accept this answer because it is more explicit. $\endgroup$ Feb 17, 2017 at 16:36
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I can do it in just 2 symbols (excluding the word minutes):
8! minutes
answered Feb 17, 2017 at 16:26
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$\begingroup$ Yess! This is the inteded answer. Thank you. $\endgroup$ Feb 17, 2017 at 16:29
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The shortest answer I can think of:
0
Because
The word "minutes" does not appear in "February 2017"
But if you're looking to express the actual duration of the month in minutes, 40320, how about this:
10
using
base 40320.
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$\begingroup$ 1st answer: No. Some calculation is required to solve the puzzle. 2nd: giving the base would be part of the answer. $\endgroup$ Feb 17, 2017 at 16:19
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2$\begingroup$ Then how is this lateral thinking and not formation of numbers? $\endgroup$– MattFeb 17, 2017 at 16:21
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1$\begingroup$ I think you are right. It is not lateral thinking any more after I explained the puzzle in in the way to express the answer. $\endgroup$ Feb 17, 2017 at 16:27
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4$\begingroup$ If only there were enough unicode characters to express it in base 40321 $\endgroup$ Feb 18, 2017 at 2:04
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1$\begingroup$ @Xavon_Wrentaile: Aren’t there? (Or was that the point?) $\endgroup$– Ry-Feb 18, 2017 at 21:36
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The Prime Factors :
$2^7\times 3^2\times 5\times 7$
(without the exponents it's 4 numbers)
Or HEXA powa :)
9D80
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$\begingroup$ Because it's the first four primes: $7$,$2$,$1$,$1$ (just the exponents). $\endgroup$ Feb 18, 2017 at 18:16
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$\begingroup$ I was listing the exponents for the first four primes. 2^7, 3^2, 5^1, 7^1. $\endgroup$ Feb 18, 2017 at 18:58
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$\begingroup$ Ok I didn't understand what you were asking, if the question is why the first 4 primes, here is The Fundamental Theorem of Arithmetic : Every positive integer greater than one can be written uniquely as a product of primes, with the prime factors in the product written in order of nondecreasing size. $\endgroup$– TomFeb 18, 2017 at 21:22
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$\begingroup$ You said "without the exponents it's 4 numbers", but discarding the first 4 primes would lose less information (if you know it's exponents, exponents for primes is a reasonable deduction). $\endgroup$ Feb 19, 2017 at 10:14