The order of books on a shelf is called wrong if no three adjacent books are arranged in order of height (either increasing or decreasing). How many wrong orders is it possible to construct from \(n\) books of different heights, if: a) \(n = 4\); b) \(n = 5\)?
Let \(a\), \(b\), \(c\) be integers; where \(a\) and \(b\) are not equal to zero.
Prove that the equation \(ax + by = c\) has integer solutions if and only if \(c\) is divisible by \(d = \mathrm{GCD} (a, b)\).
Prove that the equation \(\frac {x}{y} + \frac {y}{z} + \frac {z}{x} = 1\) is unsolvable using positive integers.
On each of four cards there is written a natural number. Take two cards at random and add the numbers on them. With equal probability, this amount can be less than 9, equal to 9 or more 9. What numbers can be written on the cards?
In the first term of the year Daniel received five grades in mathematics with each of them being on a scale of 1 to 5, and the most common grade among them was a 5 . In this case it turned out that the median of all his grades was 4, and the arithmetic mean was 3.8. What grades could Daniel have?
Several pieces of carpet are laid along a corridor. Pieces cover the entire corridor from end to end without omissions and even overlap one another, so that over some parts of the floor lie several layers of carpet. Prove that you can remove a few pieces, perhaps by taking them out from under others and leaving the rest exactly in the same places they used to be, so that the corridor will still be completely covered and the total length of the pieces left will be less than twice the length corridor.
Ben noticed that all 25 of his classmates have a different number of friends in this class. How many friends does Ben have?
One term a school ran 20 sessions of an after-school Astronomy Club. Exactly five pupils attended each session and no two students encountered one another over all of the sessions more than once. Prove that no fewer than 20 pupils attended the Astronomy Club at some point during the term.
Each of the 1994 deputies in parliament slapped exactly one of his colleagues. Prove that it is possible to draw up a parliamentary commission of 665 people whose members did not clarify the relationship between themselves in the manner indicated above.
On a line, there are 50 segments. Prove that either it is possible to find some 8 segments all of which have a shared intersection, or there can be found 8 segments, no two of which intersect.