Proving Raabe's Criteria for Convergent Sums: Steps and Hints

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Homework Help Overview

The discussion revolves around proving Raabe's criteria for convergent sums, focusing on the behavior of a specific mathematical series and its convergence properties. Participants are examining inequalities and conditions related to the series' terms.

Discussion Character

  • Exploratory, Assumption checking, Problem interpretation

Approaches and Questions Raised

  • The original poster attempts to demonstrate the correctness of an inequality related to Raabe's criteria and questions their reasoning regarding the convergence of a derived sequence. Other participants discuss the conditions for convergence and challenge the assumptions made about the series' terms.

Discussion Status

The discussion is ongoing, with participants exploring different interpretations of the convergence criteria. Some guidance has been offered regarding the conditions needed for convergence, but there is no explicit consensus on the correct approach to take.

Contextual Notes

Participants are navigating through the implications of specific inequalities and the behavior of sequences derived from the original series. There is a hint of confusion regarding the constancy of certain parameters in the context of convergence.

MathematicalPhysicist
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i'm having a problem proving raabe's criteria for convergent sums.
here in planetmath there's a description of it:
http://planetmath.org/encyclopedia/RaabesCriteria.html

i got that the first inequality is correct when mu is smaller than 1.

i got a hint in my test that i should show that {na_(n+1)} is monotonely decreasing, which i did and by another theorem to show c_n=(n-1)a_n-na_(n+1) is convergent which i also did, but i got that
(1-a_(n+1)/a_n)*n=(1-(1-1/n))*n=1>=mu.
where have i gone wrong?

thanks in advance.
 
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a Mathematical series is shown in this fasion:
a_(n+1) = a_n * q
if |q|<1 then the series is convergent.

in your case, you see than q = a_(n+1)/a_n
all you really need to show is that q<1.

remember:
the sum of that series = (1 - q^n)/(1-q)
when n goes to infinity then the sum = 1/(1-q)
 
greytomato, no. Your "q" must be constant. Using your logic, the harmonic series would be convergent...
 
so muzza, what approach should i take here?
 

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