Congratulations toSoh Yong Shengfrom
Raffles Institution, Singapore for this excellent
solution.
We have
which means
and so
.
Flipping over the fraction, we will get 1/(3 + 1/a) < 1/(3 + 1/b) and the
inequality remains the same way round when 2 is added. Flipping over again
for the last time we get
is greater than
The second part is a further expansion of the first, and in the process of
repeating the above we
know that it involves just one more flipping over of the fraction, thus
is less than the same thing with
in place of a as the inequality would
be
reversed again.
Lastly the continued fractions are expanded all the way down to
and
.
Observe the above process, we can tell that if the last or biggest number is
odd then the continued
fraction with a in it is bigger. If the last or biggest number is even then
the continued fraction with
in it is bigger. Each successive continued fraction involves one
more 'flipping over' and reverses
the inequality one more time. The following continued fraction is smaller than
the same thing with
in place of
: