WRY MATH: Pop Quiz
via The Codger, through Michelle Malkin, comes an entertaining little math problem that is actually solvable.
All you have to know is that a positive integer is a counting number, like 1, 2 or 3, etc.
My time, given a pen and scratch paper, was 23-24 seconds.
All you have to know is that a positive integer is a counting number, like 1, 2 or 3, etc.
My time, given a pen and scratch paper, was 23-24 seconds.
I think I got it too, which means I probably did not understand the question.
I'll post my answer after a suitable interval.
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No scratch paper, about fifteen seconds and an answer. Turns out to be the correct one.
but I'm a MathCounts coach and I'm used to their style of questioning... notice that i got an answer. And then checked to see if i was right. I'm always plagued by doubt...
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I don't know where the answer is, but why isn't it 11?
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My 1st thought, too (0.1 seconds), but *distinct* integers means no repeats, so "1" and "11" are okay, but not two "1"s...
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so if you're using paper, write your 11 ones and spearate them into distinct integers and add away...
in the theater of the mind, be careful about repeating integers...
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oh, the answer is in the comments section of Michelle's posting.
I don't blame you, I have to put on waders whenever I begin to delve into comments at those political sites. I'd also rather stay out of them.
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I get 11,234.
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Hello! I wachled by, saw this question, and scribbled on the back of an envelope with a wax crayon (Luddite writing implements are hard to find these days.) Am tachycardic with excitement to proceed to the comments and see that my answer, 11, 234, has been mentioned in dispatches by a Wrymouth stalwart!Woo Hoo! Perhaps a right cerebral hemisphere is slowly sprouting in the empty space it ought to have occupied since birth.
11111
111
11
1
Is there hope for Rowan the Math phobic to master the complexities of the algorithm? I need to, for change-ringing. You guys may have cool mnemonix and strategies.
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"Am tachycardic with excitement"
Rowan you are a ray of sunshine.
The margins [or tabs] sometimes disappear when translated into basic text files, as this site may be doing. Strippin off some of the formatting to save bits.
We here at Wry Mouth take no umbrage at such things.
No mnemonics were used or abused in the finding of this solution, although I will leave you with this:
Algebraic expressions, such as 1k^2 + 2k + 1 (that's 1 times k-squared plus two times k plus 1) work just like numbers, if you imagine the value of "k" (or whatever letter you use) to be = 10.
Since many texts use "x" as a letter, and the Romans used "x" to mean 10, this is pretty easy to remember.
Example: 1k^2 + 2k + 1 can be written as the product of two factors = (1k +1)(1k + 1) or (1k + 1)^2.
In exactly the same way, 121 = (11)(11) = (11)^2
FYI.
P.S. -- change-ringing is kewl!
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Hey...the columns are all transposed! How did that happen? I did my thousands, hundreds, tens and units. I didn't type them like that in the box. Michty. Okay. Trying again to show working. In actual words. :/
eleven thousand,one hundred and eleven plus three hundred plus eleven plus one.
Sigh. (Slinks off sideways, hoping to have escaped notice. :o) )
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three hundred?
Never mind, I know what you mean.
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Waa! One hundred and eleven! Cog, I am so glad you knew what I meant. I don't need to backdate my embarrassment. >-<
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no...
but you *do* have to explain that run of symbols to my naive chatroom eyes. I blanche at what that could mean...
oh, btw (HAH!), if you want math broken down into simpler ways of understanding, wry is your guy - he of private school (the presumed zenith of USA education) experience at the mid- to high-teenage years.
I have documented success in turning the young-teenagers (13 and 14) at public school (if you believe the USA reporting, USA public schools are the nadir of educational experience in the entire first and second worlds, only barely competing with third world efforts --- of course these reports are fashioned by the product of USA public schools, so the paradoxes involved approach those of theoretical time travellers who meet and kill their own parents before a union produces fruit... )
waitaminnit... that damn soapbox derailed my thoughts again... much to the chagrin of Cogit, no doubt...
... oh yeah... I'm actually pretty good at introducing the masses to elementary algebraic thought and ideas... if that matters anymore...
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Sorry, I glanced over this and glazed over and left with a pat on all of your collective heads.
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Wry...that looks like something written by NASA to alter the trajectory of a Voyager probe. (Showin my age here.) A tripwire triggers in my cerebellum when letters make the traitorous transition into Math. I am not sure if your algebraic explanation relates to the math quiz question, or to algorithms. I am way off the scale as to math gooberosity. wasn't taught any after age 13.
Raymurgy - the symbols were meant to be me 'showing my working'.But the numbers I added all went awry when posted. had meant to write:11,111 + 111 + 11 + 1 = 11,234.
Wry - thankx for the technical explanation of the wierd symbol mirror-image. I feel better!
Change ringing is indeed kewl. I hope one day to get into the team. But sitting on the bench ( an old pew) is good in itself. Bob and Wry - you will be requisitioned to the cause of campanology on yer next visit.
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Meh. It took me about 30 seconds to do it in my head. Half of that was figuring out the problem.
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It's good to know that there are still persons out there possessed of a certain amount of mental agility, Kseniya! That alone makes your comment a welcome one around here, setting aside all else. Cheers!
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