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INTRODUCTION
2.HISTORY
3.2 Combinations
P7: Combinatorics
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1. INTRODUCTION
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2. HISTORY
The pattern of numbers that forms Pascal's triangle was known well before
Pascal's time. Pascal innovated many previously unattested uses of the
triangle's numbers, uses he described comprehensively in what is perhaps the
earliest known mathematical treatise to be specially devoted to the triangle,
his Traité du triangle arithmétique (1654; published 1665). Centuries before,
discussion of the numbers had arisen in the context of Indian studies
of combinatorics and of binomial numbers and Greeks' study of figurate
numbers.
From later commentary, it appears that the binomial coefficients and the
additive formula for generating them, were known to Pingala in or before the
2nd century BC. While Pingala's work only survives in fragments, the
commentator Varāhamihira, around 505, gave a clear description of the additive
formula, and a more detailed explanation of the same rule was given
by Halayudha, around 975.
Halayudha also explained obscure references to Meru- prastaara, the Staircase
of Mount Meru, giving the first surviving description of the arrangement of these
numbers into a triangle. In approximately 850,
the Jain mathematician Mahāvīra gave a different formula for the binomial
coefficients, using multiplication, equivalent to the modern formula . In 1068,
four columns of the first sixteen rows were given by the
mathematician Bhattotpala, who was the first recorded mathematician to equate
the additive and multiplicative formulas for these numbers.
At around the same time, the Persian mathematician Al-Karaji (953–1029)
wrote a now lost book which contained the first description of Pascal's triangle.It
was later repeated by the Persian poet-astronomer-mathematician Omar
Khayyám (1048–1131); thus the triangle is also referred to as the Khayyam
triangle in Iran. Several theorems related to the triangle were known, including
the binomial theorem. Khayyam used a method of finding
nth roots based on the binomial expansion, and therefore on the binomial
coefficients.
Pascal's triangle was known in China in the early 11th century through the work
of the Chinese mathematician Jia Xian (1010–1070). In the 13th century, Yang
Hui (1238–1298) presented the triangle and hence it is still called Yang Hui's
triangle in China.
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In the west, the binomial coefficients were calculated by Gersonides in the early
14th century, using the multiplicative formula for them. Petrus Apianus (1495–
1552) published the full triangle on the frontispiece of his book on business
calculations in 1527.
This is the first record of the triangle in Europe. Michael Stifel published a
portion of the triangle (from the second to the middle column in each row) in
1544, describing it as a table of figurate numbers. In Italy, Pascal's triangle is
referred to as Tartaglia's triangle, named for the Italian algebraist Niccolò
Fontana Tartaglia (1500–1577), who published six rows of the triangle in
1556. Gerolamo Cardano, also, published the triangle as well as the additive
and multiplicative rules for constructing it in 1570.
Pascal's Traité du triangle arithmétique (Treatise on Arithmetical Triangle) was
published in 1655. In this, Pascal collected several results then known about
the triangle, and employed them to solve problems in probability theory. The
triangle was later named after Pascal by Pierre Raymond de Montmort (1708)
who called it "Table de M. Pascal pour les combinaisons" (French: Table of Mr.
Pascal for combinations) and Abraham de Moivre (1730) who called it
"Triangulum Arithmeticum PASCALIANUM" (Latin: Pascal's Arithmetic
Triangle), which became the modern Western name.
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3. PASCAL’S TRIANGLE APPLICATION
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is the kth binomial coefficient in the binomial expansion of (x + y)n, where n!
is the factorial of n, then
for any nonnegative integer n and any integer k between 0 and n.[1]
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3.2 Combinations
A second useful application of Pascal's triangle is in the calculation
of combinations. For example, the number of combinations of n things
taken k at a time (called n choose k) can be found by the equation
But this is also the formula for a cell of Pascal's triangle. Rather
than performing the calculation, one can simply look up the
appropriate entry in the triangle. Provided we have the first row
and the first entry in a row numbered 0, the answer will be
located at entry k in row n. For example, suppose a basketball
team has 10 players and wants to know how many ways there
are of selecting 8. The answer is entry 8 in row 10, which is 45;
that is, 10 choose 8 is 45.
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4. PROPERTIES OF PASCAL TRIANGLE
The first two columns aren’t too interesting, they’re just the ones and
the natural numbers.
The next column is the triangular numbers. You can think of the
triangular numbers as the number of dots it takes to make various
sized triangles.
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P3: POWERS OF ELEVEN
The triangle also reveals powers of base 11. All you have to do is squish
the numbers in each row together. Which is easy enough for the first 5
rows, but what about when we get to double-digit entries?
Turns out all you have to do is carry the tens place over to the number
on its left.
Demonstrating how to carry the ten’s place in row six to yield 11⁵
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P4: PERFECT SQUARES
4² is 6 + 10 = 16
For example,
2² → 1+3=4
3² → 3+6
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P5: THE FIBONACCI SEQUENCE
To uncover the hidden Fibonacci Sequence sum the diagonals of
the left-justified Pascal Triangle.
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P6: THE SIERPINSKI TRIANGLE
Using the original orientation of Pascal’s Triangle, shade in all the odd
numbers and you’ll get a picture that looks similar to the
famousfractal Sierpinski.. Triangle.
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P7: COMBINATORICS
Perhaps the most interesting relationship found in Pascal’s Triangle is
how we can use it to find the combinatorial numbers.
So if you want to calculate 4 choose 2 look at the 5th row, 3rd entry
(since we’re counting from zero) and you’ll find the answer is 6.
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P8: EXPANDING BINOMIALS
Suppose you have the binomial (x + y) and you want to raise it to a
power such as 2 or 3. Normally you’d need to go through the long
process of multiplying, but with Pascal’s Triangle you can avoid the
hassle and skip to the answer!
Note: Each term’s degree totals to the power that (x+y) is being raised to.
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P9: BINOMIAL THEOREM
Multiplying powers of (x+y) is cool, but how often do we come across
the need to solve that exact problem? Probably, not too often.
Wouldn’t it be handy if we could generalize the idea from the last
section into a more usable form?
Don’t let the notation scare you. It’s similar to what we did in the last
section. The best way to understand any formula is to work an
example.Let’s try (2x–3)³.
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Let x from our formula be the first term and y be the second.
Then x=2x, y=–3, n=3 and k is the integers from 0 to n=3, in this
case k={0, 1, 2, 3}.
First I’ll fill in the formula using all the above values except k:
Next fill in the values for k. Recall that k has 4 values, so we need to
fill out 4 different versions and add them together.
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We already know that the combinatorial numbers come from Pascal’s
Triangle, so we can simply look up the 4th row and substitute in the
values 1, 3, 3, 1 respectively:
With the Binomial Theorem you can raise any binomial to any
power without the hassle of actually multiplying out the terms —
making this a seriously handy tool
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P10: BINOMIAL DISTRIBUTION
The Binomial Distribution describes a probability distribution
based on experiments that have two possible outcomes. The most
classic example of this is tossing a coin.
Say we’re interested in tossing heads, we’ll call this a “success” with
probability p. Then tossing tails is the “failure” case and has the
complement probability 1–p.
Hey, that looks familiar! It’s almost the same formula as we used
above in the Binomial Theorem except there’s no summation and
instead of x’s and y’s we have p’s and 1–p’s.
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Fill in the equation for n=3 and k=0, 1, 2, 3 and complete the
computations:
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