Solution to Circular Reasoning — MIT Mystery Hunt 2021

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Answer: OLD AGE

by Anderson Wang, Azalea Weisblat, Jon Schneider, Lewis Chen and Robert Tunney

This puzzle features a series of clues. Each one can be solved as a straightforward crossword clue, or as a cryptic wordplay half.

Straight answer	Clue	Cryptic answer	Cryptic explanation
`LULLABY`	A mom or dad song	`APPARENT`	`A+PARENT homophone`
`TRACKS`	A record has some	`ALPHA`	`A+LP+HA(-s)`
`FOXTROT`	Amend's strip	`MEND`	`(-a)MEND(-s)`
`TOTORO`	Animated film "neighbor"	`COCOA BUTTER`	`COCO+ABUTTER`
`BODY PARTS`	Back, arm and guts	`KARMA`	`]K ARM A[`
`CARVE`	Beginning from wood, transform artfully	`WARM FRONTS`	`W+<TRANSFORM>`
`COCOA BUTTER`	Component of white chocolate	`ECHO`	`]E CHO[`
`BRAVO`	Curtain call?	`VALE`	`VEIL homophone`
`BOOLEAN`	Data type for falsehood	`CHARLIE`	`CHAR+LIE`
`LINE`	Downside to busy airports	`CONSPIRATOR`	`CON+<AIRPORTS>`
`CHOMPS`	Eats audibly	`FAIR`	`FARE homophone`
`SUFFER`	Endlessly endure inner agony	`BRAVO`	`BRAV(-e)+O`
`FAIR`	Even-handed	`ADD`	`_A_D_D`
`MEND`	Fix or heal	`LAHORE`	`<ORHEAL>`
`GALLON`	Fluid customary unit	`FLINCH`	`FL+INCH`
`BIRDS`	Funnily, both a rail and a loon	`HOT AIR BALLOON`	`<BOTHARAIL>+LOON`
`HERMIT`	Guy off alone	`BOOLEAN`	`BO+<ALONE>`
`CAP`	Headgear outside around the end of time at a university	`HERMIT`	`H(+E)R+MIT`
`ALPHA`	In chimpanzees, one becoming others' leader	`CHOMPS`	`CH(I→O)MPS`
`LAHORE`	Large medieval center around Pakistan's eastern border	`LINE`	`L+I(+N)E`
`VALE`	Low point / a spoken farewell	`LULLABY`	`LULL+A+BYE homophone`
`VENISON`	Meat with backstrap	`BODY PARTS`	`BODY+>PARTS`
`POLTERGEIST`	Noisy apparition	`PRESENTS`	`PRESENCE homophone`
`PRESENTS`	Offers having a ribbon topper	`BIRDS`	`BI(+R)DS`
`KARMA`	Origin of cosmic luck	`CLUCK`	`C+LUCK`
`PET SHOP`	Piglet store, maybe	`POLTERGEIST`	`<PIGLETSTORE>`
`DIAGNOSES`	Primary verdicts in one's surgery	`VENISON`	`V+<INONES>`
`ADD`	Put 2 and 2 together, say	`TUTU`	`TWO+TWO homophone`
`FOUL`	Result of countering basketball official with swears	`SUFFER`	`>SUF+FER`
`VILE`	Sandiego's organization	`DIAGNOSES`	`<SANDIEGOS>`
`CONSPIRATOR`	Sneaky figure backing a wrongful act	`FOXTROT`	`FOX+>TROT`
`FROGS`	Some of the smallest amphibians	`STAMP`	`]ST AMP[`
`CLUCK`	Chickens' sound	`FOUL`	`FOWL homophone`
`ECHO`	Source of reverberations in a cave	`CARVE`	`CA(+R)VE`
`TUTU`	Pirouetting garb	`BRAG`	`>BRAG`
`CHARLIE`	Start to card and Parker	`CAP`	`C+A+P starts`
`PIRATE`	Steal a piece of eight from a sailing ship	`GALLON`	`GALL(-e)ON`
`FLINCH`	Step back and jump	`PET SHOP`	`>PETS+HOP`
`BRAG`	Talk at length about oneself	`PIRATE`	`P(+I)RATE`
`STAMP`	To root (out)	`TOTORO`	`<TOROOT>`
`HOT AIR BALLOON`	Vehicle intended for transportation back to Kansas	`TRACKS`	`>TRAC+KS`
`DELTA`	Evolution of dalet	`DELTA`	`<DELTA>`
`APPARENT`	Visible on the surface	`VILE`	`VI(-sib)LE`
`WARM FRONTS`	Weather phenomena that bring in the start of rainstorms	`FROGS`	`F(+R)OGS`

We notice that each answer appears once in each column. This, combined with the title, suggests arranging the answers into cycles.

Additionally, each of ALPHA through FOXTROT in the NATO alphabet appears in this list, and each of them is in a distinct cycle.

ALPHA	BRAVO	CHARLIE	DELTA	ECHO	FOXTROT
In chimpanzees, one becoming others' leader	Curtain call?	Start to card and Parker	Evolution of dalet	Source of reverberations in a cave	Amend's strip
CHOMPS	VALE	CAP	DELTA	CARVE	MEND
Eats audibly	Low point / a spoken farewell	Headgear outside around the end of time at a university		Beginning from wood, transform artfully	Fix or heal
FAIR	LULLABY	HERMIT		WARM FRONTS	LAHORE
Even-handed	A mom or dad song	Guy off alone		Weather phenomena that bring in the start of rainstorms	Large medieval center around Pakistan's eastern border
ADD	APPARENT	BOOLEAN		FROGS	LINE
Put 2 and 2 together, say	Visible on the surface	Data type for falsehood		Some of the smallest amphibians	Downside to busy airports
TUTU	VILE	CHARLIE		STAMP	CONSPIRATOR
Pirouetting garb	Sandiego's organization			To root (out)	Sneaky figure backing a wrongful act
BRAG	DIAGNOSES			TOTORO	FOXTROT
Talk at length about oneself	Primary verdicts in one's surgery			Animated film "neighbor"
PIRATE	VENISON			COCOA BUTTER
Steal a piece of eight from a sailing ship	Meat with backstrap			Component of white chocolate
GALLON	BODY PARTS			ECHO
Fluid customary unit	Back, arm and guts
FLINCH	KARMA
Step back and jump	Origin of cosmic luck
PET SHOP	CLUCK
Piglet store, maybe	Chickens' sound
POLTERGEIST	FOUL
Noisy apparition	Result of countering basketball official with swears
PRESENTS	SUFFER
Offers having a ribbon topper	Endlessly endure inner agony
BIRDS	BRAVO
Funnily, both a rail and a loon
HOT AIR BALLOON
Vehicle intended for transportation back to Kansas
TRACKS
A record has some
ALPHA

The lengths of these cycles are 15 12 4 1 7 5, which, when converted to letters, make OLD AGE.

Authors’ Notes

After deciding on the extraction and confirming that there was a good &lit clue for DELTA, the five of us spent a long time over the course of a week writing the clues. The process consisted of starting from the NATO alphabet letter and trying to extend the chain up or down (i.e. finding a cryptic clue for a word that could also be parsed as a straight clue, or vice versa), while branching out to try to give as many possibilities as possible when we had to "close the loop". Here's a representative excerpt from the construction sheet:

Writing clues took wildly varying amounts of time - sometimes we were able to find a suitable clue quickly, and sometimes (especially for the longer words) it took up to an hour to extend the chain. All in all, it was really a large team effort.

Before the first testsolve, we had no idea how hard it would be to pair up the clues. We decided to start with the hardest version (all clues in alphabetical order with no additional information), fully prepared with 3 levels of nerfs in case it was too hard. We were pleasantly surprised when both testsolving groups (one more experienced with cryptics, one less) cleanly solved it.