Escape From the Prision

The warden meets with 23 new prisoners when they arrive. He tells them, "You may meet today and plan a strategy. But after today, you will be in isolated cells and will have no communication with one another. " In the prison there is a switch room which contains two light switches labeled A and B, each of which can be in either the 'on' or the 'off' position. BOTH SWITCHES ARE IN THEIR OFF POSITIONS NOW. The switches are not connected to anything. "After today, from time to time whenever I feel so inclined, I will select one prisoner at random and escort him to the switch room. This prisoner will select one of the two switches and reverse its position. He must move one, but only one of the switches. He can't move both but he can't move none either. Then he'll be led back to his cell." "No one else will enter the switch room until I lead the next prisoner there, and he'll be instructed to do the same thing. I'm going to choose prisoners at random. I may choose the same guy three times in a row, or I may jump around and come back." "But, given enough time, everyone will eventually visit the switch room as many times as everyone else. At any time any one of you may declare to me, 'We have all visited the switch room.' "If it is true, then you will all be set free. If it is false, and somebody has not yet visited the switch room, you will be fed to the alligators."

Answer:

Appoint a "scorekeeper" and the other 22 prisoners as "transmitters". When a transmitter enter the switch room for the first time, he will flick switch B ON if he sees it in an OFF position. Alternatively, he will flick switch A if he sees switch B is in the ON position and wait for his next visit. The transmitter's mission is to find ONE opportunity to flick switch B to ON position. After he completed his mission, he will flick switch A for all subsequent visits. In short, each transmitter's role is to send a signal to the scorekeeper that he has been to the switch room. The scorekeeper's role is to flick off switch B whenever he sees it in ON position. Each time he flicked off switch B he adds 1 to his score. When he see switch B is already OFF, he flick switch A instead and do not add to the score. As soon as he accumulated 22 on the score, he reports to the Warden.