An exercise from my Psychology class I took years and years ago. I though it was kind of neat it was too-hip.


You are given a Magic box with five buttons on it, each time you press a button it will do something the box can be used five times with the following cavaots.

1. It can not create more magic boxes
2. It can not create life
3. It can not alter perceptions of other people (make XXX fall in love with you or make you ruler of the world etc.)
4. It can’t directly cause death
5. It does exactly what you tell it to do.


I.e. if you pushed button one and asked for a cheese Pizza from Shakies it would make one and you would have four buttons left. If you asked for a lifetime supply of cheese pizza from Shakies it would do that and you would also have four buttons left.


So what you would do.

There are no right or wrong answers but after a week or two I will tell you want my teacher told my class and you might be surprised. If you have already done this exercise please don’t give away the ending.


This exercise has been around in different ways for years and years it has been in movies and books a variant of it was at the end of the Book “the time machine” where he came back and took three books but which books did he take.