Principle of Insufficient Reason
Statement
In the absence of any relevant evidence, agents should distribute their credence equally among all the possible outcomes under consideration. I.e., If there is not enough reason for two quantities to be different (i.e. they're indistinguishable), the extrema occurs when the quantities are the same. So basically, a symmetric expression is maximized or minimized when the quantities are the same. This is what enabled us to say WLOG.
Proof
Problems
Introductory
A hexagon is inscribed in a circle with radius . What is the maximum area of the hexagon? (Solution to Principle of Insufficient Reason Introductory Problem 1
Intermediate
1. The fraction,
where and
are side lengths of a triangle, lies in the interval
, where
and
are rational numbers. Then,
can be expressed as
, where
and
are relatively prime positive integers. Find
.
(Source: I made it. Solution here)
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