Carl Gauss's formula to quickly add up all numbers from 1 to n.. Gausss n he
Carl Gauss's formula to quickly add up all numbers from 1 to n. He came up with it as a school child when his math teacher wanted to keep the students busy for an hour, so he asked them to add up all the numbers from 1 to 100. Much to his surprise, young Carl told him in no time the result was 5050.
When asked how he could add up all those numbers so quickly, Carl said that 1 100=101, 2 99=101, etc, 50 51=101, therefore, the sum of all numbers from 1 to 100 was 101 multiplied by 50, which is 5050.
This graphic is the same formula, scribbled by my hand, just generalized to the sum of numbers from 1 to any number n. It is a classical example of how to solve a seemingly hard problem so easily that even a child could do it (even if not every child :).. Gausss n he
