I was guessing either it has fewer digits or the tens digit is less than 4 would be the desired answers depending on what the selected number was, that kind of question feels like it would predate negative numbers on the learning curve
then saying that since you can add 20 to itself to create 40 it must be less
then disregarding that and saying that the sequence of numbers proves it because we found 20 first
Honestly since it’s such a simple equation, in real life you could just say 20<40 because 20<40. You don’t really need to prove anything, the proof is in the logical operator. The homework question is dumb because it isn’t clear what they’re asking for.
God I hated questions like this in school. There’s always something specific the teacher is looking for, but nothing to point you towards it.
Usually the pointer is the blahblah the teacher was droning while you were fantasizing about the attractive classmate sitting directly in front of you
I suppose “by definition” would probably have been counted as wrong
I’m thinking maybe “Because if you subtract 40 from my number you get a negative number,” but I could be either over- or under-thinking it.
I was guessing either it has fewer digits or the tens digit is less than 4 would be the desired answers depending on what the selected number was, that kind of question feels like it would predate negative numbers on the learning curve
“Because it has less in it”
Yeah, I always felt like I was either pointlessly restating the obvious or it expected me to derive the damn thing from first principles.
AI slop proof, just because I was curious if duck.ai could do it
Using the natural numbers defined from 0 by the successor operation S:
1=S(0), 2=S(1), … , 20=S20(0), 40=S40(0)
Define a < b to mean that there exists a natural number k such that
a+k=b.
Take a=20 and k=20. By repeated addition,
20+20=40.
Since 20 is a natural number, there exists a natural number k such that
20+k=40.
Therefore, by the definition of the ordering relation,
20<40.
(Is it correct? Fuck if I know!)
A.I. is proving that 20<40 by:
Honestly since it’s such a simple equation, in real life you could just say 20<40 because 20<40. You don’t really need to prove anything, the proof is in the logical operator. The homework question is dumb because it isn’t clear what they’re asking for.