Questions tagged [pigeonhole-principle]

This tag is for questions involving the Pigeonhole Principle, which roughly states that if $n$ items are placed in $m$ containers and $n>m$, then at least one container has more than one item.

The Pigeonhole Principle roughly states that if $n$ items (e.g. pigeons) are placed in $m$ containers (e.g. pigeonholes) and $n>m,$ then at least one container has more than one item. Stated more formally, the Pigeonhole Principle asserts that there is no injective function whose codomain has smaller cardinality than its domain.

An example application of the Pigeonhole Principle is a demonstration that if five points are placed on a sphere, then there must be some hemisphere which contains at least four of these points: any two points define a great circle, which divides the sphere into two hemispheres. By the Pigeonhole Principle, one of these two hemispheres must contain at least two points. This hemisphere then contains four of the five points (the two on the boundary, and the two found via the Pigeonhole Principle).

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Assume that we have six positive real numbers whose sum is 150. Prove that there exist two of them whose difference is less than 10.

I'm trying to answer this questions using contradiction but I don't know if it's right. $$a_1 + a_2 + a_3 + a_4 + a_5 + a_6 = 150$$ Assuming that all the differences of $$a_j - a_i \ge 10$$ then. $a_1 + a_2 + a_3 + a_4 + a_5 + a_6 - (a_1 + a_2 +…
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Choose 100 numbers from 1~200 (one less than 16) - prove one is divisible by another!

Prove that if 100 numbers are chosen from the first 200 natural numbers and include a number less than 16, then one of them is divisible by another. How to prove this? many thanks....
athos
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Show that given a set of positive n integers, there exists a non-empty subset whose sum is divisible by n

This is the question I've run into: Show that given a set of positive n integers, there exists a non-empty subset whose sum is divisible by n I'm having trouble understanding how they came to the conclusion the part that I'm having trouble…
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Prove that 2 students live exactly five houses apart if

There are 50 houses along one side of a street. A survey shows that 26 of these houses have students living in them. Prove that there are two students who live EXACTLY five houses apart on the street. How do I use the pigeonhole principle for this…
meiryo
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For any arrangment of numbers 1 to 10 in a circle, there will always exist a pair of 3 adjacent numbers in the circle that sum up to 17 or more

I set out to solve the following question using the pigeonhole principle Regardless of how one arranges numbers $1$ to $10$ in a circle, there will always exist a pair of three adjacent numbers in the circle that sum up to $17$ or more. My…
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Divide the first $40$ numbers in $4$ arrays

I heard about this problem and I don't know how to solve it. Can we divide the first $40$ positive integers in $4$ arrays such that for every array choosing any $x, y, z$ (not necessarily distinct) from that array we have $x+y \not= z$ ? I think…
razvanelda
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Prove two numbers of a set will evenly divide the other

We have a set A of numbers 1, 2, 3... to 200 The question is asking me to prove that if I choose 101 numbers from the set, there will be two such that one evenly divides the other. I know this could be the pigeonhole principle question. I could…
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Pigeonhole principle problem involving inequality 0 < |$\sqrt{x} - \sqrt{y}$| < 1

21 integers are selected from {1, 2, 3, ..., 400}. Prove that two of them, say x and y, satisfy 0 < |$\sqrt{x} - \sqrt{y}$| < 1. I am confident you have to use and apply the Pigeon Hole Principle. From what I gathered, there are 400 numbers in the…
Jebediah
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Pigeonhole: 200 Balls into 101 Bins

I found the following question on this website: You have 200 monkeys placed in 101 spaceships such that each spaceship contains at least one monkey. Prove there is a subset of spaceships containing a total of exactly 100 monkeys. I suspect that…
Skorpion
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Pigeonhole Principle Problem

Problem: In the following 30 days you will get 46 homework sets out of which you will do at least one every day and - of course - all during the 30 days. Show that there must be a period of consecutive days during which you will do exactly 10…
Wesley
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Pigeonhole principle with cartesian product

Given sets $A=\{1,2,\dots ,10\}, B=\{1,2,\dots,12\}$. Let $S\subset A\times B$ s.t. $|S|=61$. Prove that there exist three pairs $(x_1,y_1),(x_2,y_2),(x_3,y_3)$ in $S$ which fulfill:$$ x_1=x_2,\quad |y_1-y_2|=1,\quad |x_2-x_3|=1,\quad y_2=y_3 $$ …
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proof using pigeonhole principle

I am struggling to come up with a proof to the following question(from cut-the-knot.org): Prove that if n is odd,then for any permutation $p$ of the set $\{1,2,3...,n\}$ the product $$P(p) = (1-p(1))(2-p(2)) \cdots (n-p(n))$$ is necessarily even. My…
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Pigeonhole Principle - Sum of Subsets

Suppose $A$ is a set of $8$ distinct positive integers, and $x \le 30$ for all $x \in A$. Show that there must be two distinct subsets of $A$ with $4$ elements whose elements when added up give the same sum. I have tried to solve this problem as…
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The Pigeonhole Principle

Vera has $10$ white socks, $10$ black socks, $10$ brown socks, $10$ blue socks, and $10$ red socks. How many socks (at a minimum) must she pull out of her sock drawer to ensure at least two matching pairs? (The two pairs cannot share a sock --…
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Proving an interesting feature of any $1000$ different numbers chosen from $\{1, 2, \dots,1997\}$

Assume you choose $1000$ different numbers from the group $\{1, 2, \dots,1997\}$. Prove that within the $1000$ chosen numbers, there is a couple which sum is $1998$. I defined: pigeonholes: possible sums. pigeons: the $1000$ different…
adamco
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