There are three gods, True, False and Random. True will always answer truthfully, False will always lie, and Random will answer your questions randomly. The gods are standing before you, but you do not know which is which. Your task is to determine the identity of the gods, by asking them three questions. To make matters worse, the gods will answer your questions only with 'da' or 'ja', which mean true and false in their own language, but you don't know which is which.

Clarifications:
* Each question can be directed only at one god, but you may ask two (or three) of your questions to the same god, if you so wish
* The gods, being gods, are all-knowing and perfect logicians.
* There's no "trick", like asking them to answer paradoxes

dont actually know the answer do any of you?

Have we seen this before... it's getting hard to remember/find out.

It seems familiar, but there are a lot of riddles with very similar premises.

I can't remember an answer though, so I'mma think out loud...

These things normally end up involving asking questions about what other question-answerers would say to the same question, but the random answerer is a confounding factor there.

I've thought before that any riddle with deterministic answerers (e.g. True False and Chooses-which-one-on-a-per-question-basis) can be solved with one question by running the chain of "What would x say if I asked them what y would say if I asked them what...." through each one twice - then all the double negatives cancel out and you get a true answer. But that won't apply here. Unless Random answers truthfully/falsely in a consistent way within one question.

On top of getting a straight answer out of these guys by asking them about each other, you've got the language barrier to overcome... which means you probably really need to identify one of the gods in 2 questions and ask a question where you know whether the answer will be true or false. That or there's a terribly clever way of doing both things in overlapping questions.

If we just pair off 2 sets of 2 adjacent gods, and ask "What would the god next to you say if I asked if he is True" ... then ... then I need to think about what you might get back. brb, truthtabling.

With that pair of questions, anyone answering yes is either Random, or sat next to Random. Not that you know which response is yes. And the random answers are rather pervasive, making reasoning about this stuff somewhat difficult.

3.30am is not the time for riddling...

Yeah, we've seen this one before.

It was mentioned in The three brothers.

By your good self young Super-King.

This is similar to this one:

http://www.tangler.com/forum/riddles/topic/54546/

but we never got an answer

how you guys find this old stuff!?!?  you google and get tangler links? or you actually serach tangler forums!? Geeesh, i can't remember riddles we had last week.     The solution is kind of in Sir M's link. Although it doesnt actually say what the question needs to be.

btw, welcome to tangler Aroundtown !!

By your good self young Super-King.

Well... I knew it seemed familiar. I still don't know the answer though 

Wait... the answer is probably on the Wikipedia page.

I still don't remember the answer...

Name GODS A, B, C and they are types TRUE/FALSE/RANDOM

Identify someone who is not RANDOM, start with B and ask him following question about A (remembering who are A and

Ask B,
      "Would you deny that A is RANDOM?"   
  1. If B answers 'ja', then
     either B is RANDOM (and is answering RANDOMly ),
     or B is not RANDOM and A is indeed RANDOM .
     Either way, C is not RANDOM definitely
  2. If B answers 'da' , then
     either B is RANDOM (and is answering RANDOMly),
     or B is not RANDOM and A is not RANDOM .
     Either way, A is not RANDOM definitely

Go to the God who was identified as not being RANDOM definitely based on B's answer
by the previous question (either A or C) and find out whether he is GOD - TRUE or FALSE by asking following question...

"If I asked you 'Are you TRUE-GOD?', would you say 'no'?

if he says NO then he is GOD-TRUE....if he says YES, then he is GOD-FALSE

Question No. 3 -

Ask the same GOD (who was identified as not being RANDOM) the question:
    "If I asked you 'Is B RANDOM?', would you say 'no'?".
    1. If the answer is 'no' then B is RANDOM;
    2. if the answer is 'yes' then the GOD you have not yet spoken to is RANDOM.

  The third GOD can be identified by elimination after we have identified first 2.

^^ Comparing that to the Wikipedia version (because damned if I know the solution any other way) there seems to be some (yes/no)/(ja/da) confusion - parts of your answer work around the fact that they won't answer yes or no, but other parts don't.

hahahahahahaahahaa...   FLG... You on drugs? I think your answer is a cut and pasted answer from several different riddles....

Gods A B C

1st Step:

Ask A: Would B give the true answer to a question?

If (Answer = I dont know) then (B = Random God)

If (Answer = Da or Ja) then ((A = Random God) or ((A = True God or False God) and (B = True God or False God))

2nd Step (only required if first answer didn't reveal the random god):

If (1st Answer Da or Ja) then

(

     Ask C: Would A give the true answer to a question?

               If (Answer = Da or Ja) then (C = Random God)
                If (Answer = I dont know) then (A = Random God)

)

3rd Step: 

Ask either non random god: Does Da/Ja = No ?

         If (Answer = opposite of what you asked) then whoever you asked is the True God

         If (Answer = same as what you asked) then whoever you asked is the False God

Then just match up whatever god type is leftover with the last god

What?      At what point did it become   "they can answer questions with 'da', 'ja' or 'i dont know' "......... I like what you've done but I think it has gone beyond the parameters of the riddle.

I remember the Wikipediaz having something about what gods should do in the event of a logically contradictory question. Like... heads exploding, or not answering, or answering that they are unable to answer. Maybe "I don't know" is another way of handling that case.

hey aroundtown....I do not think u r around town buit I think I solved the riddle OR as pt_22 says, I am actually on drugs

Sorry FLG, i should have pointed out how you were wrong, i just thought you'd know it when you re-read your answer....... You assumed for part 2 and 3 that you they answereed yes or no. You have no idea what da or ja is from your first part... In fact, your first part doesnt work as it assumes your ALREADY know what da and ja mean.....

So yup. On drugs.

Ok, so replace my "I dont know" answer with whatever they say/do when they dont know the answer. (I.e. anything that is not Da or Ja).

The rest sticks.

ok yeah I agree ...thx for saving me from drugs..I did not read full riddle as always........

here is 1 more attempt to answer.........

since you do not know what is 'da' and 'ja', ask an answer to a question to be one of the words say 'da'  (when answer is same word it means YES to main question as yes*yes= yes and no *no = yes, Lying twice equates to TRUTH, repeating same answer twice means YES)  and ask 3 Gods A,B,C questions like this

Still logic stays same....identify God who is not random and proceed to question 2

 Ask B,
      "Would you 'da'  if I asked you whether A is RANDOM?"  
  1. If B answers 'da', (same word) then
     either B is RANDOM (and is answering RANDOMly ),
     or B is not RANDOM and A is indeed RANDOM .
     Either way, C is not RANDOM definitely
  2. If B answers 'ja' (other word) , then
     either B is RANDOM (and is answering RANDOMly),
     or B is not RANDOM and A is not RANDOM .
     Either way, A is not RANDOM definitely

Go to the God who was identified as not being RANDOM definitely based on B's answer
by the previous question (either A or C) and find out whether he is GOD - TRUE or FALSE by asking following question...

"If I asked you 'Are you TRUE-GOD?', would you say 'da'?

if he says 'da' (same word) then he is GOD-TRUE....if he says 'ja', (other word) then he is GOD-FALSE

Question No. 3 -

Ask the same GOD (who was identified as not being RANDOM) the question:
    "If I asked you 'Is B RANDOM?', would you say 'da'?".
    1. If the answer is 'da' (same word) then B is RANDOM;
    2. if the answer is 'ja' (other word) then the GOD you have not yet spoken to is RANDOM.

The third GOD can be identified by elimination after we have identified first 2.

Can't the "Twins's house" riddle's solution work?

But they are three - you do however have the ability to ask several questions.

Hmm, funlovingguy already did that...

I dunno if there's a rule about resurrecting dead riddles(like threads) or not....but...this one interested me enough to sign up and post.

Using FLG's idea of labeling them.

I pose this question to God A: "If I asked you 100 times consecutively, does Da mean yes while A = Truth God, B = False God, would you always answer Da?"

2nd and 3rd questions:

"If I asked you 100 times consecutively, does Da mean yes while A = Truth God, B = False God, would you always answer Ja?"

"If I asked you 100 times consecutively, does Da mean yes while A = False God, B = Truth God, would you always answer Da?"

as long as riddle does not say solved, you can try to solve it I guess....

but if riddle creator dies or vanishes in thin air, then your efforts will go in vain if this riddle is already solved by someone else....

"I pose this question to God A: 'If I asked you 100 times consecutively, does Da mean yes while A = Truth God, B = False God, would you always answer Da?'"

Being a god, he or she would know that you are limited to three questions.  Therefore, the god would not answer the final 97 questions.  The answer would always be negative.

Do practical limitations apply to hypothetical questions?

Would impractical limitations be the alternative?

You could always just make it "If I were able to ask unlimited numbers of questions, and I then asked you 100 times consecutively..."

I believe trlovens was on the right track

Seeing I am Dutch, I know "ja" means yes

Question 1: does "da" mean false

Question 2: does "ja" mean true

Question 3: what's my name

ok this is my answer

i'll also label them God A God B  God C

seeing how i don't know which is which, i ask 1 of them, God A, " are you lying? "

the answer will always be a " No. " which will either be " da " or " ja " for example it is " da "

so No = Da

Yes = Ja

and.... i'm, stuck i spent literally 3 hours doing this the answer better be good