1953 AHSME Problems/Problem 20
Problem 20
If , then becomes:
We multiply each of the answers to get: , where is either or . Looking at the first term, we have to square , or , doing so, we get the equation . Plugging that into , we get . Multiplying by , we get the expression . Adding these two equations together, we get . To get the term , which was in the original equation, must be , giving an answer of