Q: Suppose you want to cut a circular cake with six straight cuts. What is the maximum number of pieces you can create? They can be different sizes but cannot be moved around.

A: 22 pieces.
The figure below is for 5 cuts with 16 pieces.
Each additional cut creates one more additional piece than the previous cut.
Here is the pattern:

#of Cuts #of Pieces # of Added Pieces
1 2 0
2 4 2
3 7 3
4 11 4
5 16 5
6 22 6

Q: Suppose you want to cut a circular cake with five straight cuts. What is the maximum number of pieces you can create? They can be different sizes but cannot be moved around.

A: 16 pieces…see below for a possible solution