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Mathematical fallacy. In mathematics, certain kinds of mistaken proof are often exhibited, and sometimes collected, as illustrations of a concept called mathematical fallacy. There is a distinction between a simple mistake and a mathematical fallacy in a proof, in that a mistake in a proof leads to an invalid proof while in the best-known ...
Description. The simplest and most common form of mathematical induction infers that a statement involving a natural number n (that is, an integer n ≥ 0 or 1) holds for all values of n. The proof consists of two steps: The base case (or initial case ): prove that the statement holds for 0, or 1. The induction step (or inductive step, or step ...
Proof by exhaustion, also known as proof by cases, proof by case analysis, complete induction or the brute force method, is a method of mathematical proof in which the statement to be proved is split into a finite number of cases or sets of equivalent cases, and where each type of case is checked to see if the proposition in question holds. [ 1 ...
Fermat–Catalan conjecture. In number theory, Fermat's Last Theorem (sometimes called Fermat's conjecture, especially in older texts) states that no three positive integers a, b, and c satisfy the equation an + bn = cn for any integer value of n greater than 2. The cases n = 1 and n = 2 have been known since antiquity to have infinitely many ...
In two dimensions, 2x 1 + 2x 2 is the perimeter of a rectangle with sides of length x 1 and x 2. Similarly, 4 √ x 1 x 2 is the perimeter of a square with the same area, x 1 x 2, as that rectangle. Thus for n = 2 the AM–GM inequality states that a rectangle of a given area has the smallest perimeter if that rectangle is also a square.
The proof uses mathematical induction. The case n = 1 is simply the standard version of Rolle's theorem. For n > 1, take as the induction hypothesis that the generalization is true for n − 1. We want to prove it for n. Assume the function f satisfies the hypotheses of the theorem.
The concept of proof is formalized in the field of mathematical logic. [ 12] A formal proof is written in a formal language instead of natural language. A formal proof is a sequence of formulas in a formal language, starting with an assumption, and with each subsequent formula a logical consequence of the preceding ones.
Thales's theorem. Thales’ theorem: if AC is a diameter and B is a point on the diameter's circle, the angle ∠ ABC is a right angle. In geometry, Thales's theorem states that if A, B, and C are distinct points on a circle where the line AC is a diameter, the angle ∠ ABC is a right angle. Thales's theorem is a special case of the inscribed ...