SOLUTION: The instructions are to: "Use mathematical induction to show that any postage of at lease 12 cents can be obtained using 3 cent and 7 cent stamps." I don't understand what I'm supp
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Question 991443: The instructions are to: "Use mathematical induction to show that any postage of at lease 12 cents can be obtained using 3 cent and 7 cent stamps." I don't understand what I'm supposed to do. Answer by solver91311(24713) (Show Source):
That assignment makes no sense. Induction is used to prove assertions about sequences, series, and sets with the same cardinality as the integers.
Your assertion only has one possibility if both 3 and 7 cent stamps must be used (3 possibilities if you can use all 3s or all 7s). Hence an induction proof would consist only of the base case (or possibly cases) and then there would be no need for an inductive step. UNLESS your instructor wants you to show that, once a base case, say 3 + 3 + 7, is established, that you can't make the total smaller than 12 by adding as many more stamps as you like. That is so trivial I can't really believe your instructor wants you to do that.
John
My calculator said it, I believe it, that settles it
