Chapter : Appendixes F Proofs of Theorems

Book Title: Calculus: Early Transcendentals

Printed By: Arianna Conover ([email protected])
© 2018 Cengage Learning, Cengage Learning

F Proofs of Theorems
In this appendix we present proofs of several theorems that are stated in the main body of
the text.

Section 2.3

Limit Laws

Suppose that is a constant and the limits

and

exist. Then

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

Proof of Law 4

Let be given. We want to find such that

if

then
In order to get terms that contain and , we add and subtract
as follows:

We want to make each of these terms less than .

Since , there is a number such that

if

then

Also, there is a number such that if , then

and therefore

Since , there is a number such that

if

then

Let . If , then we have ,

, and , so we can combine the inequalities to obtain

This shows that .

Proof of Law 3

If we take in Law 4, we get

Proof of Law 2

Using Law 1 and Law 3 with , we have

Proof of Law 5

First let us show that

To do this we must show that, given , there exists such that

if

then

Observe that

We know that we can make the numerator small. But we also need to know that the
denominator is not small when is near . Since , there is a
number such that, whenever , we have
and therefore

This shows that

if

then

and so, for these values of ,

Also, there exists such that

if

then

Let . Then, for , we have

It follows that . Finally, using Law 4, we obtain

Theorem

If for all in an open interval that contains (except possibly at ) and

and

then .

Proof

We use the method of proof by contradiction. Suppose, if possible, that . Law

2 of limits says that

Therefore, for any , there exists such that

if

then

In particular, taking (noting that by hypothesis), we have a

number such that

if

then

Since for any number , we have

if

then

which simplifies to

if

then
But this contradicts . Thus the inequality must be false.
Therefore .

The Squeeze Theorem

If for all in an open interval that contains (except possibly at

) and

then

Proof

Let be given. Since , there is a number such that

if

then

that is,

if

then

Since , there is a number such that

if

then
 that is,

if

then

Let . If , then and ,

so

In particular,

and so . Therefore .

Section 2.5

Theorem

If is a one-to-one continuous function defined on an interval , then its inverse

function is also continuous.

Proof

First we show that if is both one-to-one and continuous on , then it must be

either increasing or decreasing on . If it were neither increasing nor decreasing,
then there would exist numbers , , and in with such that
does not lie between and . There are two possibilities: either (1)
lies between and or (2) lies between and .
(Draw a picture.) In case (1) we apply the Intermediate Value Theorem to the
continuous function to get a number between and such that .
In case (2) the Intermediate Value Theorem gives a number between and
such that . In either case we have contradicted the fact that is one-
to-one.

Let us assume, for the sake of definiteness, that is increasing on . We take

any number in the domain of and we let ; that is, is the
number in such that . To show that is continuous at we take
any such that the interval is contained in the interval .
Since is increasing, it maps the numbers in the interval onto the
numbers in the interval and reverses the
correspondence. If we let denote the smaller of the numbers
and , then the interval is contained in the interval
and so is mapped into the interval by .
(See the arrow diagram in Figure 1.) We have therefore found a number such
that

if

then

Figure 1

This shows that and so is continuous at any number

in its domain.

Theorem

If is continuous at and , then

Proof

Let be given. We want to find a number such that

if

then
 Since is continuous at , we have

and so there exists such that

if

then

Since , there exists such that

if

then

Combining these two statements, we see that whenever we have

, which implies that . Therefore we have proved
that .

Section 3.3

The proof of the following result was promised when we proved that .

Theorem

If , then .

Proof

Figure 2 shows a sector of a circle with center , central angle , and radius . Then

Figure 2
 We approximate the arc by an inscribed polygon consisting of equal line
segments and we look at a typical segment . We extend the lines and to
meet in the points and . Then we draw as in Figure 2. Observe
that

and so . Therefore we have

If we add such inequalities, we get

where is the length of the inscribed polygon. Thus, by Theorem 2.3.2, we have

But the arc length is defined in Equation 8.1.1 as the limit of the lengths of inscribed
polygons, so

Section 4.3

Concavity Test

(a) If for all in , then the graph of is concave upward on .

 (b) If for all in , then the graph of is concave downward on .

Proof of (a)

Let be any number in . We must show that the curve lies above the
tangent line at the point . The equation of this tangent is

So we must show that

whenever . (See Figure 3.)

Figure 3

First let us take the case where . Applying the Mean Value Theorem to on
the interval , we get a number , with , such that

Since on , we know from the Increasing/Decreasing Test that is

increasing on . Thus, since , we have

and so, multiplying this inequality by the positive number , we get

 Now we add to both sides of this inequality:

But from Equation 1 we have . So this inequality

becomes

which is what we wanted to prove.

For the case where we have , but multiplication by the negative

number reverses the inequality, so we get (2) and (3) as before.

Section 4.4

In order to give the promised proof of l’Hospital’s Rule, we first need a generalization of the
Mean Value Theorem. The following theorem is named after another French mathematician,
Augustin-Louis Cauchy (1789–1857).

Cauchy’s Mean Value Theorem

Suppose that the functions and are continuous on and differentiable on

, and for all in . Then there is a number in such that

Note

See the biographical sketch of Cauchy.

Notice that if we take the special case in which , then and Theorem 1 is
just the ordinary Mean Value Theorem. Furthermore, Theorem 1 can be proved in a similar
manner. You can verify that all we have to do is change the function given by Equation
4.2.4 to the function
and apply Rolle’s Theorem as before.

L’Hospital’s Rule

Suppose and are differentiable and on an open interval that contains

(except possibly at ). Suppose that

and

or that

and

(In other words, we have an indeterminate form of type or .) Then

if the limit on the right side exists (or is or ).

Proof of L’Hospital’s Rule

We are assuming that and . Let

We must show that . Define

Then is continuous on since is continuous on and

Likewise, is continuous on . Let and . Then and are continuous

on and differentiable on and there (since and ).
 Therefore, by Cauchy’s Mean Value Theorem, there is a number such that
and

Here we have used the fact that, by definition, and . Now, if we

let , then (since ), so

A similar argument shows that the left-hand limit is also . Therefore

This proves l’Hospital’s Rule for the case where is finite.

If is infinite, we let . Then as , so we have

Section 11.8

In order to prove Theorem 11.8.4, we first need the following results.

Theorem

1. If a power series converges when (where ), then it

converges whenever .

2. If a power series diverges when (where ), then it diverges

whenever .

Proof of 1

Suppose that converges. Then, by Theorem 11.2.6, we have

. According to Definition 11.1.2 with , there is a positive integer
 such that whenever . Thus, for , we have

If , then , so is a convergent geometric series. Therefore,

by the Comparison Test, the series is convergent. Thus the series
is absolutely convergent and therefore convergent.

Proof of 2

Suppose that diverges. If is any number such that , then

cannot converge because, by part 1, the convergence of would imply the
convergence of . Therefore diverges whenever .

Theorem

For a power series there are only three possibilities:

1. The series converges only when .

2. The series converges for all .

3. There is a positive number such that the series converges if and

diverges if .

Proof

Suppose that neither case 1 nor case 2 is true. Then there are nonzero numbers
and such that converges for and diverges for . Therefore the
set is not empty. By the preceding theorem, the series
diverges if , so for all . This says that is an upper bound
for the set . Thus, by the Completeness Axiom (see Section 11.1), has a least
upper bound . If , then , so diverges. If , then is not
an upper bound for and so there exists such that . Since ,
converges, so by the preceding theorem converges.
 Theorem

For a power series there are only three possibilities:

1. The series converges only when .

2. The series converges for all .

3. There is a positive number such that the series converges if

and diverges if .

Proof

If we make the change of variable , then the power series becomes

and we can apply the preceding theorem to this series. In case 3 we have
convergence for and divergence for . Thus we have convergence for
and divergence for .

Section 14.3

Clairaut’s Theorem

Suppose is defined on a disk that contains the point . If the functions

and are both continuous on , then .

Proof

For small values of , , consider the difference

Notice that if we let , then

By the Mean Value Theorem, there is a number between and such that

Applying the Mean Value Theorem again, this time to , we get a number
between and such that
 Combining these equations, we obtain

If , then , so the continuity of at gives

Similarly, by writing

and using the Mean Value Theorem twice and the continuity of at , we
obtain

It follows that .

Section 14.4

Theorem

If the partial derivatives and exist near , and are continuous at , then
is differentiable at .

Proof

Let

According to (14.4.7), to prove that is differentiable at we have to show that

we can write in the form

where and as .

Referring to Figure 4, we write

Figure 4

Observe that the function of a single variable

is defined on the interval and . If we apply the

Mean Value Theorem to , we get

where is some number between and . In terms of , this equation

becomes

This gives us an expression for the first part of the right side of Equation 1. For the
second part we let . Then is a function of a single variable defined
on the interval and . A second application of the Mean
Value Theorem then gives

where is some number between and . In terms of , this becomes

We now substitute these expressions into Equation 1 and obtain

where
 Since and as and since
and are continuous at , we see that and as
.

Therefore is differentiable at .

Chapter : Appendixes F Proofs of Theorems

Book Title: Calculus: Early Transcendentals
Printed By: Arianna Conover ([email protected])
© 2018 Cengage Learning, Cengage Learning

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