8.3 ARITHMETIC AND GEOMETRIC SEQUENCES

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Pg451 [R] G1 5-36058 / HCG / Cannon & Elichcr 11-30-95 Airthmetic and GEOMETRIC AND GEOMETRIC SEQUENCESWhenever you tell me that mathematics is just a human invention like thegame of chess I would like to believe you. But I keep returning to the sameproblem. Why does the mathematics we have discovered in the past so oftenturn out to describe the workings of the Universe?John BarrowTwo kinds of regular SEQUENCES occur so often that they have specific names,Iremember that when Iarithmeticandgeometric treat them together because some obvi-was about twelve I learnedfrom [my uncle] that by theous parallels between these kinds of SEQUENCES lead to similar formulas. This alsodistributive law21 timesmakes it easier to learn and work with the formulas.

Both arithmetic and geometric sequences begin with an arbitrary first term, and the sequences are generated by regularly adding the same number (thecom-mon difference in an arithmetic sequence) or multiplying by the same number (the common ratio in a geometric sequence). Definitions emphasize the …

  Sequence, Geometric, Arithmetic, Arithmetic and geometric sequences, 3 arithmetic and geometric sequences