1952 AHSME Problems/Problem 18

Problem

$\log p+\log q=\log(p+q)$ only if:

$\textbf{(A) \ }p=q=\text{zero}  \qquad \textbf{(B) \ }p=\frac{q^2}{1-q} \qquad \textbf{(C) \ }p=q=1 \qquad$

$\textbf{(D) \ }p=\frac{q}{q-1} \qquad \textbf{(E) \ }p=\frac{q}{q+1}$

Solution

$\log p+\log q=\log(p+q)\implies \log pq=\log(p+q)\implies pq=p+q\implies \boxed{\textbf{(D)}\ p=\frac{q}{q-1}}$

See also

1952 AHSC (ProblemsAnswer KeyResources)
Preceded by
Problem 17
Followed by
Problem 19
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50
All AHSME Problems and Solutions

The problems on this page are copyrighted by the Mathematical Association of America's American Mathematics Competitions. AMC logo.png