Question

Can you give examples of proofs without words? In particular, can you give examples of proofs without words for non-trivial results?

(One could ask if this is of interest to mathematicians, and I would say yes, in so far as the kind of little gems that usually fall under the title of 'proofs without words' is quite capable of providing the aesthetic rush we all so professionally appreciate. That is why we will sometimes stubbornly stare at one of these mathematical autostereograms with determination until we joyously see it.)

(I'll provide an answer as an example of what I have in mind in a second)

Answer 1

A proof of the identity $$1+2+\cdots + (n-1) = \binom{n}{2}$$

(Adapted from an entry I saw at Wolfram Demonstrations)

Answer 2

The cardinality of the real number line is the same as a finite open interval of the real number line.

Answer 3

Wikipedia has a few nice proofs of the pythagorean theorem. Elementary, but elegant.

Answer 4

There's a picture proof in the Princeton Companion, or alternatively on p. 340 of Hatcher, of the fact that the higher homotopy groups are abelian. Actually, here's a screenshot of the one in Hatcher (hopefully fair-use!):

Here f and g are mappings (with basepoint) of $S^n$ into some space for n > 1; the picture shows a homotopy between f + g and g + f.

Answer 5

This other answer shows that an 8x8 board with opposite squares removed cannot be tiled with dominoes, as they are of the same "colour". But what if two squares of opposite colours are removed? Ralph E. Gomory showed that it is always possible, no matter where the two removed squares are, and this is his proof.

(Imagine A and B are the squares removed.) The image is from Honsberger's Mathematical Gems I.

Answer 6

This is elementary as well, but one of my favorite ones :)

$1^2 + 2^2 + \dots + n^2 = \frac13n(n+1)(n+\frac12)$

(Author: Man-Keung Siu)

Answer 7

There are a couple of Fibonacci identities, I think. For example

$F_0^2+F_1^2+\cdots+F_n^2=F_{n}F_{n+1}$, with $F_0=1$.

By puting together squares of side $F_n$, one at a time, you get a rectangle of dimension $F_nF_{n+1}$: The two squares of side 1, then the square of side 2, then the square of side 3 and so on.

Here is an image I found online

Answer 8

I'm partial to the proof using Dandelin spheres that (certain) cross sections of cones are ellipses, where an ellipse is defined as the locus of points whose total distance to two foci is constant. It's particularly nice because it explains the foci geometrically, as well as the focus-directrix property with some more work.

Answer 9

Because I think proofs by picture is potentially dangerous, I'll present a link to the standard proof that 32.5 = 31.5:

Answer 10

Duality between $\ell^1$ and $\ell^\infty$ norms.

and the reverse animation

Answer 11

The sequence of pictures

proves the area formula for spherical triangles $A=\hat{ABC}+\hat{BCA}+\hat{CAB}-\pi$.

Answer 12

If we have 3 circles on the plane with tangent lines, we can notice they have colinear intersection!

To prove it, we can visualize the same configuration in 3D, the balls lay on a surface and rather than tangent lines we take cones: The colinearity comes from the fact that if we lay a plane ontop of this configuration it will intersect the table in a line!

This is from 'curious and interesting geometry' and the proof is attributed to John Edson Sweet. I really like this proof because it gives a vivid example of the general idea that sometimes, to solve a problem in the most simple way you need to view it as a part of some bigger whole.

Answer 13

Here's a proof of the inequality of the arithmetic and geometric means in the form $$\frac{x_1^n}{n} + \cdots + \frac{x_n^n}{n} \geq x_1\cdots x_n.$$

Proof for $n=3$:

The "figure" for general $n$ is similar, with $n$ right pyramids, one with an $(n-1)$-cube of side length $x_k$ as its base and height $x_k$ for each $k=1,\ldots,n$.

(I made this in Inkscape, a wonderful free-software vector drawing application. For the inequality and associated labels, I used the textext extension.)

Answer 14

Sphere eversion

Answer 15

The cover of Peter Winkler's first book is a great proof without words of a statement which I'll leave you to guess, regarding the combinatorics of tiling a heaxagon with rhombi.

Answer 16

As you probably already know — there are loads of these in Proofs without Words (and II) by Roger Nelson.

Answer 17

In an attempt to push the bar towards the non-trivial, I'll mention the proof that the boundary complex of every polytope is shellable. The proof is virtually word-free but requires an actual movie rather than a still image: imagine yourself in a spaceship, taking off in a straight line from one of the facets, away from the polytope. Every once in a while a new facet is visible to you; under assumptions of general position, this provides a shelling of the complex (obviously, you need to fly off to projective infinity and come back on the other side).

This was assumed by Euler but first proved only in 1970 by Brugesser and Mani, who said that the idea came to him in a dream. More details here (search for "shellability") or here.

Answer 18

This should really be a comment on Marco Radeschi's answer from Feb 22 involving the area formula for spherical triangles, but since I'm new here I don't have the reputation to leave comments yet.

In reply to Igor's comment (on Marco's answer) wondering about an analogous proof for the area formula of hyperbolic triangles: there is one along similar lines, and you're rescued from non-compactness by the fact that asymptotic triangles have finite area. In particular, the proof in the spherical case relies on the fact that the area of a double wedge with angle $\alpha$ is proportional to $\alpha$; in the hyperbolic case, you need to replace the double wedge with a doubly asymptotic triangle (one vertex in the hyperbolic plane and two vertices on the ideal boundary) and show that if the angle at the finite vertex is $\alpha$, then the area is proportional to $\pi - \alpha$. That follows from similar arguments to those in the spherical case (show that the area function depends affinely on $\alpha$ and use what you know about the cases $\alpha=0,\pi$).

Once you have that, then everything follows from the picture below, since you know the area of the triply asymptotic triangle and of the three (yellow, red, blue) doubly asymptotic triangles.

(That picture is slightly modified from p. 221 of this book, which has the whole proof in more detail.)

Answer 19

It's a long list of wonderful answers already, but I can't resist...

Question: Is it possible to find six points on a square lattice that form the vertices of a regular hexagon?

Proof without words:

Hint: A square lattice is invariant under rotation by π/2 around any lattice point. Use reductio ad absurdum.

Credit: I learned that proof from György Elekes during the Conjecture and Proof course in the Budapest Semesters in Mathematics, after constructing a proof of my own that used entirely too many words and made very laboured use of the fact that $\sqrt{3}$ is irrational. The picture here is my own creation (using Asymptote).

Answer 20

• The first homotopy group of SO_3 has an order 2 element (that's a classic).

• The surface area of a quarter of the unit sphere is Pi via Gauss-Bonnet (My source is Ariel Shaqed - it should have been a classic, but no one I asked seems to knew it). The sphere is what you reach with a straight hand while standing still. Hold a Pencil in your hand, that's your tangent vector. Now parallel transport the pencil on a quarter sphere: it points in the opposite direction. QED

Answer 21

Q: Can you tile

with ?

Answer 22

Have a look at this document from an MIT-instructor: http://mit.edu/18.098/book/extract2009-01-21.pdf

Answer 23

Means inequalities:

(Can HM be worked in? I will add it to the picture if so)

Another one exists involving the sum $$1^3 + 2^3 + \cdots + n^3:$$

The second image is due to Brian Sears

Answer 24

Rich Schwartz had on his site a great paper consisting of only a picture which proved that every right triangle admits a periodic billiard path. Unfortunately, he's since deleted it, so I can't post it here. (It shouldn't take too long for anyone interested to re-construct the proof, though.)

Answer 25

There a proof of Erd˝os-Mordell Inequality 'without words' is an impressive one. Please follow the link http://forumgeom.fau.edu/FG2007volume7/FG200711.pdf

Answer 26

Also elementary, but here is a proof that

$C_n = \binom{2n}{n} - \binom{2n}{n+1} = \frac{\binom{2n}{n}}{n+1},$

where $C_n$ is the $n$th Catalan number.

http://utdallas.edu/~hagge/images/Catalan.pdf

Sorry for the link; new users may not use image tags.

Answer 27

The idea is to prove things in ways that are obvious to different parts of your brain, right? Anyone found any "auditory proofs"? Some candidates -

1. Nyquist sampling theorem?

2. sin[a] + sin[b] = 2sin[(a+b)/2]cos[(a-b)/2]. If you use at and bt instead of a and b, you can translate that to show how the addition of two sine tones close in frequency can also be perceived as a modulation or "vibrato" around the centre frequency. The factor of 2 might be hard, though you can add a gain instead of 2 and show that the difference is silence when the gain is 2 :)

3. Sampling in frequency domain (comb filter) is periodicity in time domain?

Here are some "audio illusions" though, for your amusement - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e6JSTkwXg90

Answer 28

This is apparently not was intended, but I think it qualifies. From Principia Mathematica: the proof of 1+1=2 (I can't include the image bc I'm a new user, but perhaps an experienced user can edit this answer for me.)

Answer 29

http://home.comcast.net/~babdulbaki/MathProofs.html

http://home.comcast.net/~babdulbaki/PWW.html (See link at bottom.)

Answer 30

Conway and Soifer tried to set a record for least number of words in a mathematical paper. I've reproduced it here in its entirety.

Can n² + 1 unit equilateral triangles cover an equilateral triangle of side > n, say n + ε?
^{John H. Conway & Alexander Soifer
Princeton University, Mathematics
Fine Hall, Princeton, NJ 08544, USA
conway@math.princeton.edu asoifer@princeton.edu}

n² + 2 can: