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Mental arithmetic

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  • A Andrea Simonassi

    To solve mentally with no use of paper, I need to imagine 5 squares, made of stones laid out on a table. we have first square that is made of 10x10 red stones. second square is made of 10x10 red stones plus 1x10 green stones at top and 10x1 green stones at right, then to fill the square we have a 1x1 square of blue stones at top right corner. third square is made of 10x10 red stones plus 2x10 green stones at top and 10x2 green stones at right, we fill the square with 2x2 stones. etc... red stones are 500 (5x10x10) green stones are 200 (20 on second square, 40 on third, 60 on fourth, 80 on fifth) blue stones (squares of 1, 2, 3, 4) are 1+4+9+16 = 30 total 730 stones. 730 / 365 = 2.

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    Jorgen Andersson
    wrote on last edited by
    #39

    Visual solving, I like it.

    Wrong is evil and must be defeated. - Jeff Ello Never stop dreaming - Freddie Kruger

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    • J Jorgen Andersson

      There's an artwork by Nikolay Bogdanov-Belsky called Mental Arithmetic. In the Public School of S.Rachinsky, 1895 - Nikolay Bogdanov-Belsky - WikiArt.org[^] The interesting part is the task on the blackboard. (102 + 112 + 122 + 132 + 142)/365 Like the Russian boys, you have no calculator and no paper. Upvotes for: 1. A good reasoned guess at the answer 2. The exact answer, with an explanation of how you got it by mental arithmetic. <edit> I should have expected you to brute force it in your heads. (You did do it without paper or calculator, right?) So from now on I will upvote elegant solutions!</edit>

      Wrong is evil and must be defeated. - Jeff Ello Never stop dreaming - Freddie Kruger

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      avanishrayankula
      wrote on last edited by
      #40

      Easiest i could think of was to simplify the numerator to (12-2)^2+(12-1)^2+12^2+(12+1)^2+(12+2)^2 And then it becomes a more manageable 5*12^2 + 2*1^2 + 2*2^2 At which point most folks would find it easy to compute the numerator to 730. Some may even factor out the 5.

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      • J Jorgen Andersson

        There's an artwork by Nikolay Bogdanov-Belsky called Mental Arithmetic. In the Public School of S.Rachinsky, 1895 - Nikolay Bogdanov-Belsky - WikiArt.org[^] The interesting part is the task on the blackboard. (102 + 112 + 122 + 132 + 142)/365 Like the Russian boys, you have no calculator and no paper. Upvotes for: 1. A good reasoned guess at the answer 2. The exact answer, with an explanation of how you got it by mental arithmetic. <edit> I should have expected you to brute force it in your heads. (You did do it without paper or calculator, right?) So from now on I will upvote elegant solutions!</edit>

        Wrong is evil and must be defeated. - Jeff Ello Never stop dreaming - Freddie Kruger

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        Member 11467608
        wrote on last edited by
        #41

        This is how I mentally solved it. Well, I used my fingers, also. 10^2 + (10 + 1)^2 + ... + (10 + 4)^2 taking into account (a + b)^2 = a^2 + 2ab + b^2, we have 10^2 appears 5 times: 500 the 2ab term gives: 2 * (10*1 + 10*2 + 10*3 + 10*4) = 20 * (1 + 2 + 3 + 4) = 200; 700, up to now then, the sum of the squares: 1^2 + 2^2 + 3^2 + 4^2 = 1 + 4 + 9 + 16 = 30. numerator sums 730. denominator: 350 + 15, times two gives 700 + 30; answer: 2

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        • J Jorgen Andersson

          There's an artwork by Nikolay Bogdanov-Belsky called Mental Arithmetic. In the Public School of S.Rachinsky, 1895 - Nikolay Bogdanov-Belsky - WikiArt.org[^] The interesting part is the task on the blackboard. (102 + 112 + 122 + 132 + 142)/365 Like the Russian boys, you have no calculator and no paper. Upvotes for: 1. A good reasoned guess at the answer 2. The exact answer, with an explanation of how you got it by mental arithmetic. <edit> I should have expected you to brute force it in your heads. (You did do it without paper or calculator, right?) So from now on I will upvote elegant solutions!</edit>

          Wrong is evil and must be defeated. - Jeff Ello Never stop dreaming - Freddie Kruger

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          jsrjsr
          wrote on last edited by
          #42

          Brute force. All in head, no paper or anything else. Wrote the post after doing it. 10x10 = 100 11x10 = 110+11 = 121 (don't remember this one) 12x12 = 144 subtotal = 365 13x10 = 130+39 = 169 (don't remember this one) 14x10 = 140+56 = 196 (don't remember this one) subtotal = 365 total = 730 divide by 365 = 2 Add one more pair of numbers and I might not have been able to do it. I dropped the 169 on the floor once before adding the second pair. I never learned the complete multiplication tables as I could do the above sort of math quickly enough to get by.

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          • J Jorgen Andersson

            There's an artwork by Nikolay Bogdanov-Belsky called Mental Arithmetic. In the Public School of S.Rachinsky, 1895 - Nikolay Bogdanov-Belsky - WikiArt.org[^] The interesting part is the task on the blackboard. (102 + 112 + 122 + 132 + 142)/365 Like the Russian boys, you have no calculator and no paper. Upvotes for: 1. A good reasoned guess at the answer 2. The exact answer, with an explanation of how you got it by mental arithmetic. <edit> I should have expected you to brute force it in your heads. (You did do it without paper or calculator, right?) So from now on I will upvote elegant solutions!</edit>

            Wrong is evil and must be defeated. - Jeff Ello Never stop dreaming - Freddie Kruger

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            megaadam
            wrote on last edited by
            #43

            I arrived at "approx 2" like so:

            Jörgen Andersson wrote:

            102 + 112 + 122 + 132 + 142

            is approx. 5 * 144 (at least one square I know) Take the five out of 365 And you have 144/73 = 2-ish.

            "If we don't change direction, we'll end up where we're going"

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            • M Member 12207222

              Use squares of binomials: 10^2 = (12 - 2)^2 = 12^2 - 4*12 + 4 14^2 = (12 + 2)^2 = 12^2 + 4*12 + 4 11^2 = (12 - 1)^2 = 12^2 - 2*12 + 1 13^2 = (12 + 1)^2 = 12^2 + 2*12 + 1 12^2 = 12^2 Add them up, sum = 5*(12^2) + 5*2 = 5 * 146 Denominator = 365 = 5 * 73 Hence ratio = 146/73 = 2 The difference of squares is quicker: (14^2 - 12^2) + (10^2 -12^2) = 26*2 - 22*2 = 4*2 (13^2 - 12^2) + (11^2 -12^2) = 25*1 - 23*1 = 2*1 Hence 10^2 + 11^2 + 12^2 + 13^2 + 14^2 = 5*12^2 + 5*2 = 5 * 146 But this year is a leap year!

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              Member 12207222
              wrote on last edited by
              #44

              Referring to my previous two solutions, here is a third and better way to do the original problem: 14^2 - 2^2 = 12*16 (difference of squares) 13^2 - 1^2 = 12*14 12^2 - 0^2 = 12*12 11^2 - (-1)^2 = 12*10 10^2 - (-2)^2 = 12*8 Adding the five lines: (sum of squares from 10^2 to 14^2) = 5*12^2 + (sum of squares from (-2)^2 to 2^2) This allows three more general problems to be investigated: PROBLEM 1: Find all sums of five consecutive squares divisible by 365, and find the resulting quotients. PROBLEM 2: Find all sums of (2n+1) consecutive squares divisible by 365, and find the resulting quotients. PROBLEM 3: This year 2020 is a leap year. Replace 365 = 5*73 by 366 = 6*61, then by any fixed whole number.

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              • J Jorgen Andersson

                There's an artwork by Nikolay Bogdanov-Belsky called Mental Arithmetic. In the Public School of S.Rachinsky, 1895 - Nikolay Bogdanov-Belsky - WikiArt.org[^] The interesting part is the task on the blackboard. (102 + 112 + 122 + 132 + 142)/365 Like the Russian boys, you have no calculator and no paper. Upvotes for: 1. A good reasoned guess at the answer 2. The exact answer, with an explanation of how you got it by mental arithmetic. <edit> I should have expected you to brute force it in your heads. (You did do it without paper or calculator, right?) So from now on I will upvote elegant solutions!</edit>

                Wrong is evil and must be defeated. - Jeff Ello Never stop dreaming - Freddie Kruger

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                Member_14771274
                wrote on last edited by
                #45

                Five consecutive squares always average to the middle square plus 2. 146 * 5 = 730. Answer = 2

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                • J Jorgen Andersson

                  There's an artwork by Nikolay Bogdanov-Belsky called Mental Arithmetic. In the Public School of S.Rachinsky, 1895 - Nikolay Bogdanov-Belsky - WikiArt.org[^] The interesting part is the task on the blackboard. (102 + 112 + 122 + 132 + 142)/365 Like the Russian boys, you have no calculator and no paper. Upvotes for: 1. A good reasoned guess at the answer 2. The exact answer, with an explanation of how you got it by mental arithmetic. <edit> I should have expected you to brute force it in your heads. (You did do it without paper or calculator, right?) So from now on I will upvote elegant solutions!</edit>

                  Wrong is evil and must be defeated. - Jeff Ello Never stop dreaming - Freddie Kruger

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                  Stan Rydz
                  wrote on last edited by
                  #46

                  I used mostly addition for the entire problem in my head. Step 1: You add a zero to the end of each term & sum the them. 100 + 110 + 120 + 130 = 600 Step 2: you multiply each term by its second digit and sum the results. 0*0=0 1*11 = 11 + 2*12 = 24 + 3*13 = 69 + 4*14 = 56 + total = 160 Step 3: the value of the expression in parenthesis is the sum of step 1 and step 2 600+160 = 730 Step 4: 730/365 = 2 All this is possible to do in your head. Though at my age my declining memory required me to redo some of these steps several times to get the answer. A calculator is much faster. This was an interesting exercise though.

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                  • M Member_14771274

                    Five consecutive squares always average to the middle square plus 2. 146 * 5 = 730. Answer = 2

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                    Stan Rydz
                    wrote on last edited by
                    #47

                    That is some amazing trivia to know

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                    • J Jorgen Andersson

                      There's an artwork by Nikolay Bogdanov-Belsky called Mental Arithmetic. In the Public School of S.Rachinsky, 1895 - Nikolay Bogdanov-Belsky - WikiArt.org[^] The interesting part is the task on the blackboard. (102 + 112 + 122 + 132 + 142)/365 Like the Russian boys, you have no calculator and no paper. Upvotes for: 1. A good reasoned guess at the answer 2. The exact answer, with an explanation of how you got it by mental arithmetic. <edit> I should have expected you to brute force it in your heads. (You did do it without paper or calculator, right?) So from now on I will upvote elegant solutions!</edit>

                      Wrong is evil and must be defeated. - Jeff Ello Never stop dreaming - Freddie Kruger

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                      MrChug
                      wrote on last edited by
                      #48

                      Yeah, 2. Multiply, add, divide. I've seen enough Vedic math ways to do things that I know my brain-dead solution could be improved. I never compare myself with any student from any time other than to say, "I'm still learning." Imagine running into a completely unschooled guy who comes up with this for an approximation of pi? Srinivasa Ramanujan - Wikipedia[^] Say WHAT!?

                      Dang! My '58 Renault Dauphine has another flat tire.

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                      • J Jorgen Andersson

                        There's an artwork by Nikolay Bogdanov-Belsky called Mental Arithmetic. In the Public School of S.Rachinsky, 1895 - Nikolay Bogdanov-Belsky - WikiArt.org[^] The interesting part is the task on the blackboard. (102 + 112 + 122 + 132 + 142)/365 Like the Russian boys, you have no calculator and no paper. Upvotes for: 1. A good reasoned guess at the answer 2. The exact answer, with an explanation of how you got it by mental arithmetic. <edit> I should have expected you to brute force it in your heads. (You did do it without paper or calculator, right?) So from now on I will upvote elegant solutions!</edit>

                        Wrong is evil and must be defeated. - Jeff Ello Never stop dreaming - Freddie Kruger

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                        Kurosh F
                        wrote on last edited by
                        #49

                        sum of the series (x+n)^2 , 0 <= n <= 4, x=10 = 5(x^2 + 4x + 6) , x=10 = 5(100 + 40 + 6) = 5(146) = 730 A contrarian solution to mental arithmetic :)

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                        • J Jorgen Andersson

                          There's an artwork by Nikolay Bogdanov-Belsky called Mental Arithmetic. In the Public School of S.Rachinsky, 1895 - Nikolay Bogdanov-Belsky - WikiArt.org[^] The interesting part is the task on the blackboard. (102 + 112 + 122 + 132 + 142)/365 Like the Russian boys, you have no calculator and no paper. Upvotes for: 1. A good reasoned guess at the answer 2. The exact answer, with an explanation of how you got it by mental arithmetic. <edit> I should have expected you to brute force it in your heads. (You did do it without paper or calculator, right?) So from now on I will upvote elegant solutions!</edit>

                          Wrong is evil and must be defeated. - Jeff Ello Never stop dreaming - Freddie Kruger

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                          Member 8573143
                          wrote on last edited by
                          #50

                          I'd say 2 too. 10^2=100 14^2=196 more or less the average of extreme values is (100+196)/2~150 150*5=750 750 must be not so far from the sum of the powers but 750/365~ 2.something than the reply most probably is 2 (5 secs the whole thing)

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