# Mensa Norway Question - squares and dots on a vertical line

Source: Mensa Norway

• Could you provide us with background information? is there a theme to the question? Tip: asking for help multiple times is likly to scare people off.
– tyui
Mar 27, 2020 at 11:36
• I can't help only seeing funny looking faces in the puzzle... Mar 27, 2020 at 13:51
• @P1storius Man, I laughed very hard after reading your comment lol .______. Mar 28, 2020 at 9:40

Add the first two columns in a row to get the third column, or the first two rows in a column to get the third row.

Nothing + Square = Square

Nothing + Dot = Dot

Two dots added together make a square.

Two squares added together make a dot.

Square + Dot cancel each other

• A more concise (but less accessible) way to frame this: the addition is modulo 3, with space = 0, dot = 1, and square = 2 (dot and square can be switched in fact). Mar 28, 2020 at 6:36
• How do you deduce that two squares added together gives a dot? Mar 28, 2020 at 11:16
• @J.Hougaard: Second column: top picture + middle picture = bottom picture. Mar 28, 2020 at 12:56
• Ah yes. Missed that. Mar 28, 2020 at 15:42

Go by the columns and add the first and second picture in a specific row to get the third picture. You can see in first column that: nothing + dot = dot, dot + square = nothing, nothing + nothing = nothing, dot + dot = square in the second column you also see that square + square = dot. Using this in the last column, there is a square in the top left, a square in the top right, a dot in the bottom left and a dot in the bottom right.

You have to solve this step by step. Compare the first with the second picture, then the second with the third picture and so forth. and keep in mind, apply the words: fly in, fly out, push, pop (more correctly apply this to the only objects, namely a dot and a square). I didn't solve this myself but I know it works this way. (if you follow each difference between the current and the neighboring picture).

Also, try describing what the dot and the square are doing, replace both objects with real life objects such as a ceramic vase and something and something other, it helps thinking that both imagined real life objects are moved into directions by a person and what is unecessary gets removed.

+----------------+
|  1  |  2  |  3 |
+----------------+
|  4  |  5  |  6 |
+----------------+
|  7  |  8  |  9 |
+----------------+


Your preparation should look something like this to identify the logic behind. Excuse me for the abandoned preparation.