[Genius if you can solve it?] Insight and intuition: a challenging IQ quiz

4

Did you figure out the pattern from the answers? They’re all animals, but the animals themselves aren’t very relevant—if you write them in kanji, the answer becomes clear: dog (犬), bird (鳥), rabbit (兎), cat (猫), horse (馬). It was the number of dots (、) contained in the kanji!

9

An equation that looks disjointed at first glance: “tongue = 3, eye = 4, nose = ?”. In fact, it’s a quiz that replaces the five senses with numbers. The tongue is associated with taste, so the number is 3. The eye is associated with sight, so the number is 4. The nose is associated with smell, so the number is 9. The numbers themselves don’t carry any deep meaning, so the more you try to find some ulterior intent, the more you might tie yourself in knots. It’s a refreshing, insight-based riddle that falls into place once you shift your perspective.

2

People who solved this right away must have pretty high IQ or intuition, no? Once you figure out what TDFK stands for, the answer should be easy. TDFK is short for “to-dō-fu-ken” (the four types of prefectural jurisdictions in Japan): there is 1 “to” (metropolis), 1 “dō” (territory), and 43 “ken” (prefectures). That leaves “fu” as Osaka and Kyoto, so the correct answer is 2.

medicine

This is one of those questions where you go “Ah!” once you hear the answer, right? Yes—the riddle mentions fingers: thumb, index finger, middle finger, ring finger, little finger. So the correct answer was “medicine.” Was that a bit too easy?

1 bundle

What you’d normally think of is the calculation “2 + 3 = 5.” But in fact, this is also a riddle that uses a play on words. The question “How many bouquets is it when combined?” actually means physically bundling them together. In other words, if you put a bouquet of 2 and a bouquet of 3 together, they become one large bouquet. If you realize it’s not about ‘adding’ the numbers but ‘bundling’ them, your knack for insight is pretty impressive.

U

You might think it's some kind of code with letters arranged in a regular pattern—maybe there's a way to read it? The answer is “U.” The pattern is the initials of the Chinese zodiac written in the Latin alphabet. Since ox, rabbit, and horse are included, it was “U.”

autumn leaves

You might be tempted to think there’s some rule related to the seasons at play here, given the way these words line up... but try adding “udon” or “soba” after each word. While “autumn leaves soba” or “autumn leaves udon” sound like something you might find at a tourist spot, they aren’t commonly used, right?