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Visualizing For Infinite Series: The Direct Comparison Test

1) The document presents an analogy to visualize how the Direct Comparison Test works for determining if an infinite series converges or diverges. It uses the analogy of a "magic box" that can float and be pushed either to the floor or ceiling. 2) The test involves finding another series to act as "hands" that are either above or below the original series, and pushing in a way that determines convergence or divergence. 3) An example demonstrates using a simpler convergent series as the "hands" to show that the original series converges, matching the conditions of the Direct Comparison Test.

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72 views

Visualizing For Infinite Series: The Direct Comparison Test

1) The document presents an analogy to visualize how the Direct Comparison Test works for determining if an infinite series converges or diverges. It uses the analogy of a "magic box" that can float and be pushed either to the floor or ceiling. 2) The test involves finding another series to act as "hands" that are either above or below the original series, and pushing in a way that determines convergence or divergence. 3) An example demonstrates using a simpler convergent series as the "hands" to show that the original series converges, matching the conditions of the Direct Comparison Test.

Uploaded by

missued
Copyright
© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PPT, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Visualizing The Direct Comparison Test for Infinite Series

A Presentation by Pablito Delgado


Sponsored by the Center for Academic Program Support (CAPS) University of New Mexico

Why Are We Doing This?


To make Calculus students suffer!!! Just kidding! :)
Actually, Convergence and Divergence of Infinite Series is a pretty tough cookie for many calculus students. This is because... Theres lots of different tests for convergence and divergence Its hard to understand what each of these tests mean and how to use them. This presentation shows a new way to visualize how The Direct Comparison Test works with Infinite Series by using an analogy which (we hope) is easy to understand... ENJOY! :)

Just to refresh your memory...


A sequence is just a list of numbers:
Ex: 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, 16, 18, 20, 22, 24, etc... Ex: 129437, 2, 13, 9859, 487, 12, 84, 7437, etc...

A series is the addition of a list of numbers:


Ex: 2+4+6+8+10+12+14+16+18+20+22+24+etc... Ex: 129437+2+13+9859+487+12+84+7437+etc... We usually write a series like this:

a
n 1

where

an

is a list of numbers (sequence)

Sequences and Series


Continued...
An INFINITE SERIES is the addition of an infinite list of numbers:
Ex:

2n 2 1 2 2 2 3 2 4 ... to infinity and beyond!


n 1

2 2 2 2 2 n 1 2 3 4 5 ... to infinity and beyond! Ex: n 1

1 1 1 1 1 1 Ex: n 2 1 2 2 32 4 2 52 ... to infinity and beyond! n 1

The BIG QUESTION is:


If you added up an INFINITE list of numbers, Would you eventually get a REGULAR NUMBER (not infinity) or would you get INFINITY? If you get a Regular Number, your Series CONVERGES If you get Infinity, this means your series DIVERGES Ok... so now, how the heck do we do find out if a series converges or diverges?

TESTS!!!
Dont worry... you wont be taking the test! Your series will take it for you... :) You just have to grade his test! :)
There are lots and lots of tests to do this: Direct Comparison Test, Limit Comparison Test, Integral Test, Ratio Test, Root Test, Alternating Series Test, Geometric Series Test, etc... Here, we are only going to talk about the Direct Comparison Test and how it works.

The Direct Comparison Test


The Boring Book Definition: (BOOO!!!)
Part 1 The series

series bn such that bn < an and bn diverges, n 1 then the series an diverges. n 1 Part 2

a diverges if there exists another


n 1 n

The series

series bn such that an <bn and bn converges, n 1 then the series an converges.
n 1

a converges if there exists another


n 1 n

The Analogy (Yippee!!!)

Ok... Imagine for a moment that you have a MAGIC BOX (ooh! aah!) This magic box has the ability to float in the middle of the air! (wow!)

Where will the magic box go?

You decide that want to push this magic box somewhere... either on the ceiling or on the floor...

Push it to the floor

If you want to push it to the floor, your hands need to be ON TOP of the box, and you need to push downward

Push it to the ceiling

If you want to push it to the ceiling, you need to put your hands underneath the box, and then push upward

Going nowhere...

If your hands are ON TOP of the magic box, and you push UPWARD, What happens to the box? NOTHING!

Going nowhere, again!

If your hands are UNDERNEATH the magic box, and you push DOWNWARD, What happens to the box? NOTHING!

Put it all together...


For the Direct Comparison Test, you can think of the magic box as the series an which you want to n 1 find out if it converges or diverges.
You can think of your hands as the other series bn
n 1

Pushing downward means your bn converges


n 1

Pushing upward means your bn diverges


n 1

The Direct Comparison Test Part 1 (rewritten)


If you want to show that an converges: n 1 This is like trying to push the magic box down to the floor. You need to have two things 1. You need to have your hands (bn) on top of the magic box (an) Mathematically, this means that bn > an
2. You need to have your hands ( bn ) push n 1 downward Mathematically, this means bn has to converge
a If you can find bn that does this, then
n 1 n 1 n

converges

a n diverges, If you want to show that n 1 This is like trying to push the magic box up to the ceiling. You need to have two things 1. You need to have your hands (bn) underneath the magic box (an) Mathematically, this means that bn < an

The Direct Comparison Test Part 2 (rewritten)

bn ) push upward 2. You need to have your hands ( n 1 Mathematically, this means bn has to diverge
n 1

If you can find a bn that does this, then an diverges


n 1

The Direct Comparison Test Limitations


Remember that if you have your hands ON TOP of the magic box and you push upward, nothing happens... Similarly: bn If you have a bn > an and diverges, then n 1 nothing happens... you dont prove anything
If you have your hands UNDERNEATH the magic box and you push downward, nothing happens... Similarly: bn diverges, then If You have a bn > an and n 1 nothing happens... you dont prove anything

2 Lets try to show that converges. n 2 n n 1 1 Lets place in 2 our magic box
n 1

Example: 1

n 2n

If you want to show that converges, then we need to put our hands on top of it and push downward...

1 2 n 1 n 2n

Example: continued...
Lets try to choose something SIMPLE that (we 1 already know) converges... Lets choose 2
n 1

This new series that we chose will become our hands. So now, we have to figure out if our hands go ON TOP or UNDERNEATH the MAGIC BOX. If we plot the graphs of 1 f (n) 2 (hands) and n
f ( n) 1 (magic box ) 2 n 2n

1 1 We can easily see that the graph of n 2 is on top of n 2 2n

Example: continued...
Since the graph of our hands is on top of the graph of the magic box, this means that we can place our hands on top of the magic box

And since we know ahead of time that n 1 converges, this means that we have everything we need to push the magic box downward... thus 1 proving that n 2 2n converges!
n 1

1 n2

Believe it or not...
The idea of putting your hands on top of the magic box and pushing downward is the basic principal behind other convergence tests as well !!!
The next time you try to prove that a series converges / diverges, try using the magic box to help you figure out what you need to do, and to check if you did it right!

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