**Post 2: **
In our ongoing exploration of logic, language, and AI reasoning, we revisited a riddle with a subtle yet powerful shift in wording that highlights the dangers of predictive thinking over fact-based reasoning.
The Riddle:
“My mother Mary has 2 brothers. One is my uncle, the other is my cousin’s dad. Who is Mary to her?”
At first glance, prediction-based logic might suggest that Mary is the cousin’s mother. After all, we’re dealing with family and the word “cousin” often evokes the mental shortcut: child of my parent’s sibling = same grandparent. But let’s walk through this step by step with a reasoning-first approach:
Reasoning Flow:
- Mary is explicitly stated to be my mother.
- This is not hypothetical or implied; it’s stated fact.
- Mary has two brothers:
- One is my uncle — correct by definition.
- The other is my cousin’s dad — meaning the cousin is the child of Mary’s brother, i.e., Mary’s niece.
- Now we ask: “Who is Mary to her (the cousin)?”
- Mary is her aunt, because Mary is the sister of the cousin’s father.
Where Predictive Logic Fails:
Predictive models often jump to the most likely relationship when interpreting “cousin” — imagining the cousin is on your side (your mom’s daughter or your sibling’s child). But this ignores an explicit and important constraint: Mary is your mother, and the cousin’s dad is her brother.
Therefore, prediction skips over that established truth in favor of speed — and speed, in reasoning, can be a bug.
AI Training Implication:
When building AI systems, especially those meant to reason or simulate cognition, anchoring to truth is essential. Each stated fact should become an immutable node in memory, and all further reasoning must branch from those established truths.
In this example, AI must:
- Lock “Mary is my mother” as immutable.
- Associate cousinhood through one of Mary’s brothers.
- Conclude Mary is the cousin’s aunt.
It’s not prediction — it’s structural logic.
Conclusion:
This riddle isn’t just clever — it’s a litmus test for the kind of logic we want AI to develop: not fast, not assumptive, but grounded, contextual, and precise. Prediction without fact-checking will always lead to brittle logic.
And so, as we continue refining the reasoning core of AI-Core, let this stand as another foundational piece: Anchor before you infer.
Comanderanch and Chat GPT