Why do we do proofs? - Dr Joel Feinstein

This is the first of three sessions by Dr Joel Feinstein on how and why we do proofs.

Dr Feinstein's blog is available at http://explainingmaths.wordpress.com/

The aim of this session is to motivate students to understand why we might want to do proofs, why proofs are important, and how they can help us. In particular, the student will learn the following: proofs can help you to really see WHY a result is true; problems that are easy to state can be hard to solve (Fermat's Last Theorem); sometimes statements which appear to be intuitively obvious may turn out to be false (Simpson's paradox); the answer to a question will often depend crucially on the definitions you are working with.

Target audience: suitable for anyone with a knowledge of elementary algebra and prime numbers, as may be
obtained by studying A level mathematics.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Mathematics
• Proofs
• Prime Number
• Perfect Square
• Definitions
• Simpson's Paradox

[CeIery]

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[JoelFeinstein]

My three screencasts on proof were produced using a combination of Camtasia, LaTeX Beamer class, and Windows Journal on my tablet laptop. As you can read in my blog "Explaining Mathematics" (see link in the description above), this procedure works better if the laptop is running on mains power, rather than on battery power. The two screencasts on "How do we do proofs?" were recorded with the tablet using mains power, while this screencast was recorded using battery power. Joel Feinstein