H E L L O
my name is
Dr. 3832's Puzzle of the Day

Today's Puzzle

Wednesday, January 13
Today's puzzle is courtesy of Jason, who asks: Here are the names of some objects. What are they?

4401 Aditi
1815 Beethoven
4864 Nimoy
9007 James Bond

Hint

BONUS: Send me a funny message with a number in it from the numbering system above. (Internet research is allowed, naturally, but solve the main puzzle first or it will be spoiled!)

   


     Note: Clicking "Submit" will send your response to Dr. Shapiro.

Yesterday's Puzzle + Solution

MNESOTA VIKGS UNID STAS EAT ANDSON AOUNT AESS POPAR CTURE INDIGENO ATRALIAN

What Prf Schl–related phrase is encoded in this strange message?

Solution Each pair of consecutive words is missing a common pair of letters:
MINNESOTA VIKINGS UNITED STATES GREAT GRANDSON ACCOUNT ACCESS POPULAR CULTURE INDIGENOUS AUSTRALIAN

Those pairs of letters spell INTEGR CCULUS. Repeat the operation to get INTEGRAL CALCULUS!

Congratulations to yesterday's solvers Jacob C., Hazel, Yana, Charlie, Maddy, and Graham. Thanks to everybody who made a guess!

About This Site

Though he now teaches mathematics, Dr. (né Mr.) Shapiro's first job in a K–12 school was as a lunch monitor in Davis, CA. It was there that he originated the Puzzle of the Day, even rewarding correct answers with tickets in denominations like "15 points" (though without a clear idea of how he'd ultimately redeem these). Dr. Shapiro's favorite puzzle from this pre-professional era was "Tell me the location of the beehive on this campus."

Ten years later, Dr. Shapiro revived Puzzle of the Day at Proof School, writing each day's puzzle on a name tag. After 600 puzzles or so, he was just starting to feel normal about students reading his chest all the time when campus closed and the puzzle, like the rest of our lives, moved online. New puzzles are posted daily on school days.

Want to catch up on old PotDs? There's an archive currently containing puzzles from March to December 2020.