Run! Run! As fast as you can!

You’ll never catch me, you’ll fall into the Atlantic Ocean and drown, man!
— Glenn Stevens

PROMYS Scavenger Hunt Test #1.5 Boston, July 26, 2019

Exploration. For the most points, be inventive!

P1: Find a sandpile and study its longterm behavior.
P2: Find a protest and join it. Investigate their ideals. Are they principled? Are they left or right ideals? Are they
radical? Can you annihilate them?
P3: Find a 1 in nature. Find a 2 in nature. Find a 3 in nature and yeet it.
P4: Find math on a chalkboard that you don’t understand. Bonus points for learning what it means and explaining it.
P5: Find the number of rooms in CAS. How many of them are open? How many are not closed? Any conjectures?
P6: How many distinct diacritical marks can you find on signs? Can you find Marks dying critically?
P7: Find a place where a boat can go under a train, going under a car, going under a plane.
Techniques of Generalization. Additional points will be awarded for generalizations.
P8: Can you draw a fish behind your back? Play fish behind your back? Fish behind your back?
P9: Take a selfie. Take a selfie of someone taking a selfie. Take a selfie of someone taking a selfie of someone taking
a selfie.
P10: Hahn is hahndsome. Joye is joyeous. Is Chris christened? Can you generalize?
P11: Can your group fit in a sidewalk square? In half a sidewalk square? In a quarter sidewalk square?
P12: Find pictures of fractions. Fractions of pictures. Pictures of fractals. Pictures of \mathfrak.
Prove or Disprove and Salvage if Possible. Remember to give counterexamples to all false statements and salvage
if necessary.
P13: Never gonna give you up. Never gonna let you down. Never gonna turn around and hurt you.
P14: Everything you read is true. True on the internet. True on a chalkboard. True on the sidewalk.
P15: PROMYS students make stable pyramids
P16: It is impossible to break Hagaromo chalk
P17: Warren Towers is the only building in which PROMYS has been held.
P18: PROMYS students are path connected. PROMYS students are simply connected. PROMYS students are totally
connected. PROMYS students are romantically connected.
P19: The periodic table in STO B50 is error-free.
P20: Any path from Warren to STO B50 crosses the green line.
P21: Nothing rhymes with Babubabu.
P22: Everything written in Hagoromo is true. Is everything written in Crayola false?
P23: X is a cat ⇐⇒ X meows.
Numerical Problems. (Some food for thought) Remember to make conjectures!
P24: Can you find a BU classroom number ≥ 100 that is prime? Square? Two classroom numbers that are a solution
to x2 − 2y 2 = 1? A classroom number with class number ≥ 5? Two classroom numbers whose quotient is a
convergent of the continued fraction of π? A classroom number that can be written as a sum of 2 squares in 6
different ways?
P25: Estimate the length of Warren Tower’s shadow at 8PM. At 7PM. At 6PM.
P26: Estimate the number of noodle shops on Commonwealth Avenue. Burrito restaurants? City Convenience stores?
P27: Find the following: a ring, a group, a root, a square, a field, a tree, a forest, a stalk, a stack, a germ, a sheaf, a
variety of flags, a spherical building. Can you see the forest for the trees?
P28: Find geometry and symmetry. The the most symmetric object you can. The most asymmetric object.
P29: Find the genus of Warren Towers.
1
P30: Can you find Art of the Deal? Fifty Shades of Grey? Sheaves in Geometry and Logic? The Yellow Shed by the
Linden Tree? Nip the Buds, Shoot the Kids?
P31: Compute your Social Security Number and mother’s maiden name.
P32: Find a stranger with the following: A fidget spinner. A textbook. A phone that isn’t a smart phone. An age ≤ 3.
An age ≥ 73.
Miscellaneous Problems.
P33: Roll around in the grass until rabbits come and start licking you.
P34: Crabwalk down a city block.
P35: Find calculator on the street and use it to perform calculations.
P36: Sing a Christmas Carol in Kenmore square.
P37: Host a rap battle between Crayola and Hagoromo. Who won?
Ingenuity.
P38: Teach a stranger why 0 · a = 0. Bonus points if they can repeat the proof to the camera!
P39: Explain a sidewalk poem to a stranger.
P40: Interpret the proof of Fermat’s Last Theorem as a dance. Is it a tango?
P41: Does there exist a configuration of ≥ 4 PROMYS students that touches the ground in exactly 2 places?
Disingenuity.
P42: Cheer for the Yankees next to Fenway Park.
P43: Find a stranger, and have them explain why Z has unique prime factorization. Which of the following rings do
1
√ √ √
1+ −67
they think also have unique prime factorization: Z[i], Z[ 2 ], Z[ 2], Z[ −5], Z[ 2 ]. The ring of continuous
functions R → R. Bonus points if they explain their reasoning!
P44: Play duck duck goose with two ducks and a goose.