p.carter question

[David Spero]

Phillip Carter wrote:

Word sequence:

dig minim militia sieve ave

Whic of the following words continues the sequence?

avail oval valid mail

I never saw the answer, although I believe one was posted.

NONSPOILER

My best shot at this is "valid." The number of letters (5) continues
the series, 3,5,7,5,3, and I chose valid because it has no long vowel
sounds, just like the words in the series. EXCEPT that I have no idea
how "ave" is pronounced, and the inclusion of a weird word like "ave"
indicates that there must be a more interesting solution.

So could someone tell me what it is?

David

[Peter Suzman]

In article <APC&1'0'56e2bcf4'b...@igc.apc.org>,

David Spero <mrro...@igc.apc.org> wrote:
>Phillip Carter wrote:
>
>Word sequence:
>
>dig minim militia sieve ave
>
>Whic of the following words continues the sequence?
>
>avail oval valid mail
>
>I never saw the answer, although I believe one was posted.
>

<snip>

>So could someone tell me what it is?
>

I haven't seen a confirmation from Phillip, but the answer I posted was:

The odd letters in each word connsidered as Roman numerals are:

i ii iii iv v

making the next one in the sequence "vi" from "avail."

Incidentally, you can use Deja News or Alta Vista to find posts that you
missed.

Peter

[Peter Suzman]

In article <4uvaoh$tno...@netcom.com>,

suz...@netcom.com (Peter Suzman) wrote:
>In article <APC&1'0'56e2bcf4'b...@igc.apc.org>,
> David Spero <mrro...@igc.apc.org> wrote:
>>Phillip Carter wrote:
>>
>>Word sequence:
>>
>>dig minim militia sieve ave
>>
>>Whic of the following words continues the sequence?
>>
>>avail oval valid mail
>>
>>I never saw the answer, although I believe one was posted.
>>
><snip>
>>So could someone tell me what it is?
>>
>
>I haven't seen a confirmation from Phillip, but the answer I posted was:
>
>The odd letters in each word connsidered as Roman numerals are:

This should of course have been EVEN letters, and "connsidered" doesn't look
too good in retrospect either.

>
>i ii iii iv v
>
>making the next one in the sequence "vi" from "avail."
>

Peter

[Philip Carter]

In article <4uvaoh$tno...@netcom.com>, Peter Suzman <suz...@netcom.com>
writes

>I haven't seen a confirmation from Phillip, but the answer I posted was:
>
>The odd letters in each word connsidered as Roman numerals are:
>

>i ii iii iv v
>
>making the next one in the sequence "vi" from "avail."

Yes, that is exactly what I had in mind.
--
Philip Carter

[David Spero]

Re: dig, minim, militia, sieve, ave

If the right answer is "avail" because of the "vi", then why isn't
"valid" just as valid? True, there's an "l" in the way, but the same
is true of "militia."

BTW, why "ave"? What is ave, anyway? That really threw me.

I apologize for spelling your name wrong, too. I like your puzzles a
lot.

David

[Philip Carter]

In article <4v3u64$e...@igc.apc.org>, David Spero <mrro...@igc.apc.org>
writes

No problem about the spelling, David. The precise solution I had in mind
was that in each word you delete the first letter then each alternate
letter to leave the Roman numerals, i,ii,iii.iv,v,vi. Ave was the only
three letter word I could think of that had a `v` in the middle to meet
the requirement of the puzzle, but it is in all my dictionaries and
means `welcome or farewell`.
--
Philip Carter

[Tom Zych]

Philip Carter wrote:

> No problem about the spelling, David. The precise solution I had in mind
> was that in each word you delete the first letter then each alternate
> letter to leave the Roman numerals, i,ii,iii.iv,v,vi. Ave was the only
> three letter word I could think of that had a `v` in the middle to meet
> the requirement of the puzzle, but it is in all my dictionaries and
> means `welcome or farewell`.

Well, "ave" is really Latin, yes? Would you settle for "ivy"? Or "eve"?
Or "ova", which, though originally Latin, is more a part of English than
"ave", IMHO - opinions?

TZ

[Jonathan R. Ferro]

David Spero wrote:
>
> Phillip Carter wrote:
>
> Word sequence:
>
> dig minim militia sieve ave
>
> Whic of the following words continues the sequence?
>
> avail oval valid mail
>
> I never saw the answer, although I believe one was posted.

SPOILER

Taking the letters at the even-numbered positions in the words:
dig -> _i_ == I
minim -> _i_i_ == II
etc.
ave -> _v_ == V

the answer is
avail -> _v_i_ == VI

-- Jon

[Philip Carter]

In article <3217C7...@hicom.net>, Tom Zych <tom...@hicom.net> writes

Agreed and accepted!
All the best.
--
Philip Carter