if a ship has 27 crew, and less prisoners in the hold, half the prisoners escaped leaving the ship 15% less occupied than before

I got the same answer as you Chris.

There is an error in the question.

😕

Call the full ship, 27 + x, where x is the number of prisoners....and if (1/2)x escape, then the number of people on the ship now equals 27 + (1/2)x ...therefore

27 + (1/2)x  = .85(27 + x)

27  + (1/2)x = 22.95 + .85x

4.05  = .35x

x = about 11.57

Sorry...I can't get the numbers to work, here....!!!!   (???)

Thanks, Melody....at least there weren't any "inverse functions" involved......LOL!!!!

Yes lol

I haven't finished with that other problem yet.  Alan is very sure he is right.  😯

I'm never very sure I'm right!  Sometimes I'm uncomfortably aware I'm wrong (though I'm sticking with my answer for f^-1(6) for now)!

.

Yes at the moment we are all reasonably sure that we are right.

It is just a pity that our answers are different.   :)

Let's hope the original poster comes back with the right answer from whoever set the question.

I might go back and look at it again soon.

I want to ask you what might be wrong with some of my logic.