Watch the picture carefully.  Count the men.  How many? 12 or 13?  The picture stays the same, and the men only move around (right?), so what happened to the missing man?

Hey, could you be so kind to explain that crazy "gif"?! I have to admit I didn't take the time yet, to figure it out. Great journal! Paul =)

Maybe the missing man just up and died?

Neat

NERD ALERT! NERD ALERT! djRolla is about to do an analysis and solution on this problem.

I noticed this when I first looked at that .gif file but I thought we could all see it. It looked plain to me?

Take a look at the first 'man' on the lower left. This is the one who creates the missing man. If you notice when all the body parts shift to the other side, the body parts are about half the size of the full body EXCEPT for the man in the lower left. He only has the top part of his hair move. By doing this he does not need to have anything replace it when it moves to the other side thus he is the one who can create the missing man. Does that sound logical? If not then maybe try this:

When the file first loads you have this combination of men in rows:

3 2 2 3 2

When it changes it has this combination of men in rows:

3 3 2 3 2

Thus it is the second row that changes from 3 to 2 and back to 3 and so row two is the row that looses the man. How? Once again watch the front man in the first row, the one in the lower left, and then watch the man in the back of the forth row. The man in the back of the forth row will just move himself over to the back of the second row while the front man in the first row will only loose the top part of his hair. Thus the missing man basically appears and disappears in the second row.

HANDS OFF THE SLIDE RULE!

I can see that, but I still don't 'get' it...

Think of it this way. When the top part of the bodies shift over to the other side there needs to be one body for each part that sifts over. Correct? What I mean is when one body on the left side has the top part move over to the right then there has to be one body over on the right waiting for it. The same goes for any body on the right side that shifts over to the left. It is an even exchange. For every body part that shifts left there is exactly one body part that shifts right. EXCEPT for the first man in the far left row!

Now look at what I wrote about the body in the front of the first row on the left side. This is the one who creates the missing man. When everything shifts, this man in the front of the first row only shifts the top part of his hair but no body part from the other side hooks up with this man. He is the one who creates the missing man!

So here is another empty blog with nothing in it. Where do they all come from?

Clever!

I agree! It is!

Hey Zig old bloke! How long did it take for you to figure that one out? I looked at it from an absract view and spotted the solution. Nice place yuh got here ol Buddy. :)

I have seen that before but I don't remember where and when?

That is most interesting!

Yes that is interesting!