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I mean, is there any other solution? There are certainly no integral solutions to the problem, but there is a unique (rational) solution. I feel like I’m missi
by LolWolf 8y ago
I mean, is there any other solution? There are certainly no integral solutions to the problem, but there is a unique (rational) solution.
I feel like I’m missing something entirely, though...
- Sharlin 8y agoI was also stuck thinking in integers for a few seconds, perhaps because of the context. But yeah, a 10-year-old would already know about fractions.
- endeavour 8y agoI also mentally started thinking about integral solutions. I wonder if it's also because of the variable names... a,b,c tend to be used to represent integers (e.g. Fermat's Last Theorem, Euclid's algorithm etc). x and y are more commmonly used to represent real numbers.
- dzdt 8y agoRandom aside: once in high school I took a math puzzle test. The only problem I skipped was because they asked for "integral solutions." I knew the word "integral" only as belonging to calculus, about which I knew nearly nothing at the time. If I had realized in context it just meant "integer" I could have done it!
- intrasight 8y agoThey did make it a tricky question!
- intrasight 8y agoThanks for pointing that out. I'll use X and Y next time I share this story. Of course my daughter wouldn't have known at the time about the distinction, and neither did I - it having been too long since doing algebra ;)