a) One person had a basement illuminated by three electric bulbs. Switches of these bulbs are located outside the basement, so that having switched on any of the switches, the owner has to go down to the basement to see which lamp switches on. One day he came up with a way to determine for each switch which bulb it switched on, descending into the basement exactly once. What is the method?
b) If he goes down to the basement exactly twice, how many bulbs can he identify the switches for?
Will thought of a number: 1, 2 or 3. You can ask him only one question, to which he can answer “yes”, “no” or “I do not know”. Can you guess the number by asking just one question?
Peter thought of a number between 1 to 200. What is the fewest number of questions for which you can guess the number if Peter answers
a) “yes ” or “no”;
b) “yes”, “no” or “I do not know”
for every question?
There are 4 coins. Of the four coins, one is fake (it differs in weight from the real ones, but it is not known if it is heavier or lighter). Find the fake coin using two weighings on scales without weights.
Is it possible to draw from some point on a plane \(n\) tangents to a polynomial of \(n\)-th power?
Prove the following formulae are true: \[\begin{aligned} a^{n + 1} - b^{n + 1} &= (a - b) (a^n + a^{n-1}b + \dots + b^n);\\ a^{2n + 1} + b^{2n + 1} &= (a + b) (a^{2n} - a^{2n-1}b + a^{2n-2}b^2 - \dots + b^{2n}). \end{aligned}\]
Prove that if \((p, q) = 1\) and \(p/q\) is a rational root of the polynomial \(P (x) = a_nx^n + \dots + a_1x + a_0\) with integer coefficients, then
a) \(a_0\) is divisible by \(p\);
b) \(a_n\) is divisible by \(q\).
Derive from the theorem in question 61013 that \(\sqrt{17}\) is an irrational number.
Prove that the root a of the polynomial \(P (x)\) has multiplicity greater than 1 if and only if \(P (a) = 0\) and \(P '(a) = 0\).
For a given polynomial \(P (x)\) we describe a method that allows us to construct a polynomial \(R (x)\) that has the same roots as \(P (x)\), but all multiplicities of 1. Set \(Q (x) = (P(x), P'(x))\) and \(R (x) = P (x) Q^{-1} (x)\). Prove that
a) all the roots of the polynomial \(P (x)\) are the roots of \(R (x)\);
b) the polynomial \(R (x)\) has no multiple roots.