This classic family riddle has been completely stumping people online! It looks like a simple math question at first glance, but it is actually a clever test of how carefully you read.
The riddle asks: “A man has 4 daughters. Each daughter has 2 brothers. How many children does he have?”
What makes this puzzle so tricky is that our brains naturally want to do some quick multiplication. When reading this fast, many people assume that if there are four daughters, and each one has two brothers, they need to add eight boys to the four girls. That would equal 12 children, which is by far the most common wrong answer!
But take a moment to think about how a family works.
All four girls are sisters in the exact same family. If there are two boys in the family, they are the brothers to every single one of those girls. Therefore, each daughter shares the exact same two brothers.
To find the true solution, you simply add the four daughters to their two shared brothers.
Answer: 6.
