Jellybeans
One new addition to the FanFest menu, and there are going to be more, stay tuned, is a jellybean guessing contest.
We are going to put jellybeans into one of the SAL Championship Trophies, and closest guess will win a BlueClaws prize pack. A buck a guess, to BlueClaws Charities.
Now, how do you go about winning such a contest?
It just so happens that a blog called Cleverness, Getting Diggy With It has a few ideas.
Strategies for Victory
There are a couple of strategies you may use in calculating the number of jellybeans in a jar or other container. In order of increasing complexity, they are:
1) Guess
It’s just a game. Arm yourself with the knowledge that there are 930 jelly beans in a US gallon (about 245 / litre) and venture a WAG. I suspect you wouldn’t be reading this if that’s all you were after, loser. So…
2) Count them
Don’t count each bean, of course, but if you are allowed to lift the container, you can count the number of jelly beans in one row (remember to compensate for tapering at the bottom of the container) and multiply that number times the number of jellybeans the container is tall. This will yield a very good estimate.
3) Equate them
This strategy is best if you are “guessing” the number of jellybeans in a known volume. In fact, it’s almost fool-proof in that situation. You need to know:
a) The approximate volume of one jelly bean can be thought of as a small cylinder 2 cm long and 1.5 cm in diameter (Precisely articulated as: Volume of 1 Jelly Bean = h(pi)(d/2)^2 = 2cm x 3 (1.5cm/2)^2 = 3.375 or 27/8 cubic centimeters)
b) Due to the Jelly Bean spape and irregularities, there is considerable airspace in the container, along with the jelly beans. It can be assumed that 20% of a given volume is air rather than jellybeans (though for very small or irregularly shaped containers, this figure might be slightly more… never estimate more than 25% air by volume. Really 20% is the best value to use for n > 100)
So, to get your answer, you will want to determine the number of cubic centimeters in the container volume and multiply that number by can simply use a calculator to divide the volume of the container in cubic centimeters by 2.7 (3.375 * .8 to allow for air space). Google is a great too for doing all of this. For example a search for “cubic centimeters per gallon” and Google returns “1 US gallon = 3 785.4118 cubic centimeters”. You can then use Google (they call it Google Calculator but you use the normal search engine box) to calculate your answer. 5 gallon bucket = 5 x 3785.4 = 18,927. You just pop ’round the gorn-and-scumbles, and, Jack’s a doughnut, there you are!
That is fascinating.
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