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How can two people share a cake fairly if they prefer different bits?

One person wants the icing; the other prefers the sponge. Equal-sized slices need not feel equally valuable. In the two-person cut-and-choose procedure, one person divides the cake into pieces they value equally, and the other selects a preferred piece. Fairness is assessed through each person’s own preferences.

3–7 min

Questions you could explore

  • Why does the chooser’s preferred piece have to be worth at least half of the whole to that chooser?
  • Which assumptions would fail if an important part could not be divided?

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Maths and statistics

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When one long wait changes the average

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How can two people share a cake fairly if they prefer different bits? | Speech Topic | speaking.app