This classic coin riddle says: A woman has two coins that add up to 30 cents. One of them is not a nickel. What are the two coins?
The answer is: a quarter and a nickel.
A quarter is worth 25 cents and a nickel is worth 5 cents, giving a total of 30 cents.
The trick is in the wording. The riddle says one of them is not a nickel. That is true: the quarter is not a nickel. It never says that neither coin is a nickel.
Most people hear the phrase “one of them is not a nickel” and assume the puzzle has ruled out nickels completely. Reading the sentence literally reveals the simple solution. One coin is a quarter, and the other coin is the nickel.
