A classmate posted this on facebook today.
It’s got all the makings of a perfect viral challenge – the taunt about preschoolers (CITATION NEEDED) alerts you that you should easily be able to solve it, and then the bit about it taking longer if you’re highly educated ([SOURCE]) really just needles you in the most annoying manner possible.
So naturally I ignored the fact that it’s just a made-up code with no research behind it and happily wasted 30 minutes on it. Some people just want to watch the world burn.
Anyway, having succeeded in this experiment, I can resolutely confirm to you all that I suck at riddles.
… I have always sucked at riddles, and I’m honestly not entirely sure why I thought this would be any different. Hope springs eternal, or something.
How about you? How long did it take? (Spoilers in the comments).
Action Potential 
Just kidding, I’m not giving the answer here. I am, however, linking to THIS: http://i.imgur.com/BPcT8.gif
I don’t get it… love the kitteh though!
easy, the answer is 2…took abouk 2 minutes
i got 2 also… took 5
I give up. Guess higher education made me dumb, because I don’t even understand how it’s 2. :S
I am clearly a kinetic learner… I was struggling and went to reorganize / write it out and tadaa! Took me 7 minutes.
Thanks for the study break!
It took me about 5 minutes, although probably would have taken much longer if not for the clue about preschoolers. Btw, I showed it to my preschooler, who told me the answer was 17, then gave up.
Hahahaha, that’s the best!
Took me 10 mins? anyway, the preschooler thing really tips it to make it easier, takes all math out of it. Being a math minded person, I tried to start solving it with math anyway, lol.
Ok, I have looked at this for at least 10 minutes and it is just NOT coming to me. Looking at a pile of numbers makes me a feel a little nauseous so I do think I am well suited to solve this problem!
I get 2 in about a minute. It helps that a couple of decades ago I was given this problem, which I was told “NASA Astrounauts” couldn’t figure out but kids could:
What are the next two letters in this sequence? OTTFFSS
Aaaaand there goes my evening. Hmm…
EN? =)
yup, 2. took about 30 seconds. but my brain has been evaporating recently after too much time out of work.
The preschooler clue was excellent. For some reason I thought of coloring them with crayons, and the answer came almost immediately.
will someone plese explain this bullshit
It took me about 2 minutes as well. I was gonna give up after a minute and a half and I’m glad I didn’t, ’cause it’d still be bugging me if I had.
a bunch of engineering undergrad students sat around a table for 25 min. trying to figure this out… then when I finally solved it I jumped up brimming with excitement lol
i was just using Stumble.. and came across this…. i figured out the answer really fast…
i don’t see anyone explained how the answer is 2 so i thought i would explain how i figured it out.
i just looked at the first two sets of numbers and tried to think about it as simple as i could….
the first set of numbers was 8809 = 6 …. and the 2nd set of numbers was… 7111 = 0 …. this is perfect to use to figure out the puzzle, one code equals the highest number and the other the smallest number…
i didn’t bother thinking about math, preschoolers don’t know much math… what do preschools know, they know shapes!
so look at the shapes!
the first code was 8809 and it has six circles ! two circles in each number 8 and one each in 0 and 9…
i confirmed my theory with the 2nd code, 7111… there was no circle shapes in that code… so i skipped all the other numbers and easily solved the last one…
all in about 20 seconds?
ps…i can’t do any big math in my head, and can only use a calculator to do the basic shit! i am not much smarter than a preschooler! i just happen to have read alot of sherlock holmes and love mystery books and shows.