Problems

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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?

Prove the following formulae are true: \[\begin{aligned} a^{n + 1} - b^{n + 1} &= (a - b) (a^n + a^{n-1}b + \dots + b^n);\\ a^{2n + 1} + b^{2n + 1} &= (a + b) (a^{2n} - a^{2n-1}b + a^{2n-2}b^2 - \dots + b^{2n}). \end{aligned}\]

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.

Prove that the following polynomial does not have any identical roots: \(P(x) = 1 + x + x^2/2! + \dots + x^n/n!\)