Can you solve the frog riddle? - Derek Abbott

You’re stranded in a rainforest, and you’ve eaten a poisonous mushroom. To save your life, you need an antidote excreted by a certain species of frog. Unfortunately, only the female frog produces the antidote. The male and female look identical, but the male frog has a distinctive croak. Derek Abbott shows how to use conditional probability to make sure you lick the right frog and get out alive.

Lesson by Derek Abbott, animation by Artrake Studio.

[schwererziehbar]

I wish I had a 67% chance of getting a female.

[zestypatmike]

Plot twist! The frogs were just hallucinations from the mushrooms he ate and were actually just more poisonous mushrooms

[randomdodo]

me: smart enough to deduct which frog is a female, and which is not
also me: eats a random mushroom, expecting to be okay

[mompernl]

“You only have enough time to go in one direction”
*spends 10 minutes calculating*
“Ok time to go to the cleari-“ *dies*

[herculesatan]

Guy: *Gets poisoned and has a few seconds to live.*
Also guy: hang on, lemme go over the probability first.

[bumble.]

My question is, how did he know all this about the antidote when he didn't know the mushroom was poisonous?!?

[AlmostAnimixers]

I love these kinds of riddles, where the puzzle necessitates that you don't have time to go after all three frogs, but you do have time to calculate conditional probability in your head.

[marsy_]

"So youre stranded in a huge rainforest, and youve eaten a poisonous mushroom."
Very relatable situation, Ted-Ed.

[ohdeer-sabrina]

I just went with "Oh, males make sounds to attract mates, so the other frog heard it and came there, therefore is a female"

Guess I'm not a math person lol

[chopdecipher]

*got poisoned by a mushroom*

"And it may just be your lucky day"

[rubinthepig]

Step 1:confirm you have green eyes
Step 2: ask the poison to leave

[WaughinJarth]

If you think about it in a more realistic setting, two frogs next to each other are very likely to be mates, as they are not fighting over the one on the stump. This means that it is instantly way more likely for one of two frogs to be female.

[selinumur]

real solution: dont eat random mushrooms

[xidesvan]

I think you'd die by the time you finish calculating...

[darcieevans]

I just guessed that a female would be hanging around the male 😂😂

[GabrielTheMagolorMain]

1:06
Imagine he does that and realizes he violated two frogs for nothing.

[potatobeans]

"you only have time to go in 1 direction"

*Does math that takes over a minute*

Logic: this is fine.

[davidmejia]

I've played enough fire emblem to know a 67% chance ain't goin to save anyone's ass

[andreashaugeandersen]

Enlighten me: He licks both frogs on the left and 1 is male, meaning the last is 50/50 of being male/female = 1 frog is uncertain and 1 is 50/50 so left is 50% since he licks both
Then the right side is also a 50/50
He argues that the combination of female + male is different from male + female, but it doesn't matter when both are licked anyways, so it is the same thing
Therefore both sides have a 50% chance of survival or am I missing something?

[Hoolny]

Having a male and a female on different positions dosent actually add to probability it would still be 50% their is one frog and that frog has a 50/50 chance of being a male or a female same with the frog on the trunk both answers are 50/50 we can just ignore the male frog as the male frog isn’t there for a specific reason no reason to account it to our decision