The trickiness is that it was a part of a set of easy questions. You have 3 same numbers x x x, then change two of them, and ask what's the third y y ? It seems obvious it's y again.
Of course if you have some experience with math (apparently more experience than kids in school have), it's immediately apparent it's a multiplication and the product doesn't scale linearly… But I can imagine myself still answering this incorrectly just because I have no incentive to be careful and I'm in a state of mind to just answer the question quickly. Though while reading the article I solved it, in memory.
> The trickiness is that it was a part of a set of easy questions. You have 3 same numbers x x x, then change two of them, and ask what's the third y y ? It seems obvious it's y again.
OK… That's all?
I start to see the problem.
But I'm not going to write what my conclusion is as this would get likely down-voted into oblivion. (I was actually expecting down-votes already just for asking but still wanted to understand what the issues here is as I honestly don't see any "tricky part" in the "puzzle" at all.)
Of course if you have some experience with math (apparently more experience than kids in school have), it's immediately apparent it's a multiplication and the product doesn't scale linearly… But I can imagine myself still answering this incorrectly just because I have no incentive to be careful and I'm in a state of mind to just answer the question quickly. Though while reading the article I solved it, in memory.