2016 AMC 12A Problems/Problem 5

Revision as of 12:40, 5 February 2016 by Swe1 (talk | contribs) (Fixed MAA box)
(diff) ← Older revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)

Problem

Goldbach's conjecture states that every even integer greater than 2 can be written as the sum of two prime numbers (for example, $2016=13+2003$). So far, no one has been able to prove that the conjecture is true, and no one has found a counterexample to show that the conjecture is false. What would a counterexample consist of?

$\textbf{(A)}\ \text{an odd integer greater than } 2 \text{ that can be written as the sum of two prime numbers}\\ \qquad\textbf{(B)}\ \text{an odd integer greater than } 2 \text{ that cannot be written as the sum of two prime numbers}\\ \qquad\textbf{(C)}\ \text{an even integer greater than } 2 \text{ that can be written as the sum of two numbers that are not prime}\\ \qquad\textbf{(D)}\ \text{an even integer greater than } 2 \text{ that can be written as the sum of two prime numbers}\\ \qquad\textbf{(E)}\ \text{an even integer greater than } 2 \text{ that cannot be written as the sum of two prime numbers}$


Solution

In this case, a counterexample is a number that would prove Goldbach's conjecture false. The conjecture asserts what can be done with even integers greater than 2. Therefore the solution is \[{\textbf{(E)}\text{ an even integer greater than 2 that cannot be written as the sum of two prime numbers.}}\]

See Also

2016 AMC 12A (ProblemsAnswer KeyResources)
Preceded by
Problem 4
Followed by
Problem 6
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
All AMC 12 Problems and Solutions

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