Lost in Numbers

I am taking my CAT exam this year (yes, again) and am just tired & frustrated of all the complicated, twisted Math problems.
Not only are some of the questions quite senseless but also hilarious. Don’t take my word for it; take a look at some of the questions that I remember.

(Also supplied are some of the answers that I actually would give if it wasn’t a multiple choice thing)

Question 1: A tap fills a bucket at the rate of 2 milliliters per minute. The bucket has a hole at the bottom, which empties the bucket at the rate of 1.8 milliliters per minutes. If the tap is left running, what portion of the bucket is full after 4 hours?

Answer 1: Apply sealant to the hole in the bucket to stop the water from draining and in 15 minutes the bucket will be overflowing, forget four hours.

Question 2: A passenger train leaves point ‘A’ at 10:00 am at the speed of 4kmph. A goods train leaves point ‘B’ at 11:00 am at the speed of 6kmph in the opposite direction. Points A and B are ‘X’ kilometers apart. A bird flies from the passenger train to the goods train and back. Where will the bird be when the two trains meet?

Answer 2: hopefully as far as possible from the meeting point of the trains, because there will be a big mess when the trains do eventually meet.
A slight variation of the above question…

Question 3: A passenger train leaves point ‘A’ at 10:00 am at the speed of 4kmph. A goods train leaves point ‘B’ at 11:00 am at the speed of 6kmph in the same direction. Points A and B are ‘X’ kilometers apart. At what distance from ‘A’ will the goods train overtake the passenger train?

Answer 3-1: The goods train never manages to overtake the passenger train as there is a heard of cows on its track.
Answer 3-2: The goods train is behind the passenger train and on the same track; hence the goods train will never overtake the passenger train.
Another variation of the above question…

Question 4: A tortoise starts moving towards point ‘A’ at 1kmph, at the same time a hare starts to move towards the same point at 2kmph. The hare is 10 km behind the tortoise at the start. At what distance will the hare overtake the tortoise?

Answer 4: According to the story of the hare and the tortoise, the hare falls asleep till the tortoise reaches the end. This leads me to conclude that the hare never overtakes the tortoise, which makes the question invalid. (A rocket scientist he isn’t)

Okay so I am not that good at solving these questions in their right spirit, but that does not stop the exam papers from carrying such questions and neither does it stop me from asking some questions of my own.

For question 1: Okay so some genius realized that the bucket has a hole, and all he/she did was try to fill it up even though it would eventually empty out. Why would someone in their right mind try to fill a broken bucket?Secondly at a time when we get water for only two hours in the morning and three in the evening how are we supposed to keep the tap running for 4 hours, that too continuously?

For question 2: Why would the bird fly from one train to the other and back, does it not have any other work?

For question 2&3: Why would some one put two trains on the same track, going in opposite directions or in the same direction, so that they will actually meet at some point?

I am not even going to the last question…I guess maths will always be maths, but common sense will always be uncommon.

Anyways, I ll get back to my papers . .

“while recording the scores of the students in the mark’s register, the professor made a mistake – he exchanged the tens & units digit of the scores of the 2 students and wrote for two students marks which were 25 lower than their actual marks. If the average score of the class after these errors was 67, what was the actual avergae score of the class?”

What the f…. ! Do I care ????? Fire the professor, for God’s sake !!