The winning team, which irember, was a russian team. They divided the labor so they had one person who was asorting colors and another person who was sorting edges. And yet all of a sudden you've taken this beautiful, contemplative thing and turned it into this frantic, stress filled thing of timing. You could have an idea of starting a jigsaw puzzle from the center. Most people start on the edges because it'll bet easier. But say, s want tostart fom the center and let blossom out toward the edges and and fill out that that image.
How much of life can be solved by algorithms, and how much just can't be solved? Listen as A.J. Jacobs, author of The Puzzler, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the lessons he learned from solving every kind of puzzle imaginable, including the biggest stumper of all: what it really means to be a human being.