Problems

A group of schoolboys are going to walk down a narrow path in a straight line, one behind the other. There are \(11\) boys, and among them are Will, Tom, and Alex. If exactly two of them walk directly next to each other, they will start arguing. But if the three of them are all next to each other, in any order, the third one will always break the argument of the other two. We don’t want any arguments to persist. How many ways are there to order all \(11\) boys?

For a natural number \(n\) consider a regular \(2n\)-gon, with every vertex coloured either blue or green. It is known that the number of blue vertices equals the number of green vertices. Show that the number of main diagonals (passing through the centre of the \(2n\)-gon) with both ends blue is the same as the number of main diagonals with both ends green.

Coloring is a very neat technique in problems involving boards since it allows us to simplify the problem a great deal. The important part is focusing on an adequate subset of the squares, however doing it with colors is a lot easier.
The kinds of colorings can be very different and there is no general rule for determining which one is going to solve the problem. There are some colorings (such as a chessboard coloring) that are frequently used, but the only way to learn how to use this technique is by solving several problems of this style.
When the problem is related to pieces covering a certain figure, the “good colorings” are those that yield an invariant associated with the pieces. This can be the number of squares of one color they cover, the number of colors they may use, some parity argument, etc. Coloring is basically an illustrative way to describe invariants.

One can hardly imagine modern life without numbers, but have you wondered when and how the numbers were invented? It turns out people started using numbers about \(42000\) years BCE supposedly to mark the dates in calendar. But how do we represent the numbers in writing? Well, there are two ways: examples of the first abstract numeral systems are generally tallying systems, the ones where the value or contribution of a digit does not depend on its position, a good example is the famous Roman numeral system: \(I\, V\, X\, L\, C\, D\, M\), here a digit has only one value: \(I\) means one, \(X\) means ten and \(C\) a hundred. However, one might struggle to express large numbers in Roman system.
Majority of ancient civilisations, Sumerian, Egyptian, Babylonian, Chinese, Japanese, Indian used what is called positional numeral systems, where the contribution of a digit to the value of a number is the value of the digit multiplied by a factor determined by the position of the digit. All these systems, even when invented independently, have something in common, they are what is called "base-\(10\)".
Try to guess why do we use the decimal numeral system, which has exactly \(10\) digits in our everyday use. Because it does not actually have to be \(10\) digits, it could easily be \(3,8,16\), the binary system (with only digits \(0\) and \(1\)) is used in all electronic devices, since it is enough to represent any bit of information we might possibly know.

Generally, when a line intersects a circle, it creates two different points of intersection. However, sometimes there is only one point. In such case we say the line is tangent to the circle. For example on the picture below the line \(CD\) intersects the circle at two points \(D\) and \(E\) and the line \(CB\) is tangent to the circle. To solve the problems today we will need the following theorem.
Theorem: The radius \(AB\) is perpendicular to the tangent line \(BC\).

Geometry reminder

We call two polygons congruent if all their corresponding sides and angles are equal. Triangles are the easiest sort of polygons to deal with. Assume we are given two triangles \(ABC\) and \(A_1B_1C_1\) and we need to check whether they are congruent or not, some rules that help are:

• If all three corresponding sides of the triangles are equal, then the triangles are congruent.

• If, in the given triangles \(ABC\) and \(A_1B_1C_1\), two corresponding sides \(AB=A_1B_1\), \(AC=A_1C_1\) and the angles between them \(\angle BAC = \angle B_1A_1C_1\) are equal, then the triangles are congruent.

• If the sides \(AB=A_1B_1\) and pairs of the corresponding angles next to them \(\angle CAB = \angle C_1A_1B_1\) and \(\angle CBA = \angle C_1B_1A_1\) are equal, then the triangles are congruent.

The basic principles about parallel lines and general triangles are:
1. The supplementary angles (angles "hugging" a straight line) add up to \(180^{\circ}\).
2. The sum of all internal angles of a triangle is also \(180^{\circ}\).
3. A line cutting two parallel lines cuts them at the same angles (these are called corresponding angles).
4. In an isosceles triangle (which has two sides of equal lengths), two angles touching the third side are equal.

Consider the following sum: \[\frac1{1 \times 2} + \frac1{2 \times 3} + \frac1{3 \times 4} + \dots\] Show that no matter how many terms it has, the sum will never be larger than \(1\).

Today’s topic is inequalities, expressions like \(a\geq b\), or \(a>b\). There are certain rules for operating inequalities: one can subtract the same number from both sides of the inequality, namely if \(a\geq b\), then \(a-b \geq 0\). If \(a \geq b\) and \(b\geq c\), then \(a\geq c\). If a number \(c\geq 0\), then from \(a\geq b\) it follows that \(ac \geq bc\). However, in case of multiplication by a negative number \(c\leq 0\), the inequality sign reverses: from \(a\geq b\) it follows that \(ac \leq bc\). One should also remember that the square of any real number is non-negative.

Draw how Robinson Crusoe should put pegs and ropes to tie his goat in order for the goat to graze grass in the shape of a square, or slightly harder in a shape of a given rectangle.

Draw how Robinson Crusoe should put pegs and ropes to tie his goat in order for the goat to graze grass in the shape of a parallelogram.