A circle solution to World's Hardest Easy Geometry Problem

The World's Hardest Easy Geometry Problem ruined my sleep.


Find the measure of x without elementary geometry about triangles.

I tried that problem a few months ago for a few hours and failed, so I cheated and looked up the answer.
But today I dreamed about that problem. In my dream, I saw myself using circle to solve that problem.
I woke up, it's 3 am, great time to work on a geometry problem.

So I did. I succeed!
It is cheating to use circles. Only basic properties about triangles, angles and lines are allowed.
Please don't read this if you want to have your own fun with the problem first.
I also have a link for a triangle only solution.

Note: My graph is different because I changed the name of point E to D, and D to E.
Here is where da solutions at.

First looking show that CE=BE, so it's nice to consider using symmetry to solve the problem.
Construct EI \perp CB
Draw a circle pass through E,D,F
Reflect all points through EI
The graph looks like this:

It's easy to see there are some equations
\begin{eqnarray}
\angle C &=& \frac{\stackrel{\frown}{EF}+\stackrel{\frown}{GF}-\stackrel{\frown}{HD}}{2}\\
\angle ADB &=& \frac{\stackrel{\frown}{FG}}{2}\\
\end{eqnarray}
All the angles listed above can be found directly because the other two angles in the triangle are already known.
After finding all the size of those angles and multiply 2 to each side, it reduce to a few simple linear equation, all we have to do is to solve it.
It's a easy linear system can be computed by hand.
Set

\begin{eqnarray}
a=\stackrel{\frown}{FE}\\
b=\stackrel{\frown}{HD}\\
c=\stackrel{\frown}{FG}\\
\end{eqnarray}


\begin{eqnarray}
40^\circ  &=& a+c-b\\
60^\circ  &=& c\\
\end{eqnarray}
We end up with this

20^\circ  = b-a
c=b because the graph is symmetric.
a = 40^\circ
Thus x = 20

Q.E.D.[Quite Exhausting Demonstration]

I need to start to train my subconscious so I can do math when I'm asleep.


Humm I just noticed... I

Mgccl's picture

Humm I just noticed... I still have to prove that the center of the circle is on EI.

FUCK U

FUCK U

Short and sweet way of solving this question

Hi. Regarding to this question,I solve it by this way. I simply substituted my own values into one of the lengths of the triangle. Eg: AB=5 and I can easily solve the whole thing using just sine rule and cosine rule in less then 5 minutes.

hehe... a cheating way when

Mgccl's picture

hehe... a cheating way when the original question asks not to use trigonometry...

Oops.

I see. I will try it again by just applying Euclidean Geometry.

Sines and Cosines?

Hello, I almost got it done but how do you solve it with sine and cosine? I am taking calculus now but I don't see how to solve with w/ sine and cosine as there is no length, only angles. If you could post a link to your scanned image of work or write it out here that would be great.

Thanks.

Assume 1, 10, or a for any

Assume 1, 10, or a for any of the sides of the triangle. Work the problem in terms of these assumed values. Once you know ratio of the sides of the right triangle you can find the angle using arctan, arcsin, arccosine operation.

I just had an

Mgccl's picture

I just had an enlightenment.
For problems like this without any particular values. I should assume one instead of any variable.
1 reduce the amount of writing involved compare to assume it as a variable x.

Post new comment

The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.
If you have a Gravatar account, used to display your avatar.
  • Allowed HTML tags: <img> <a> <em> <strong> <cite> <code> <ul> <ol> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd> <span> <fn>
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.
  • Textual smileys will be replaced with graphical ones.
  • You can enable syntax highlighting of source code with the following tags: <code>, <blockcode>. Beside the tag style "<foo>" it is also possible to use "[foo]".
  • Use [fn]...[/fn] (or <fn>...</fn>) to insert automatically numbered footnotes.

More information about formatting options

What is 2 + 8?
To combat spam, please solve the math question above.
Honey Pot that kill bots