Unique factorization and the fundamental theorem of arithmetic

• David Sprows ^[1]
  1. [1] Villanova University

     Villanova University

     Township of Radnor, Estados Unidos

     
• Localización: International journal of mathematical education in science and technology, ISSN 0020-739X, Vol. 48, Nº. 1, 2017, págs. 130-131
• Idioma: inglés
• Texto completo no disponible (Saber más ...)
• Resumen

  • The fundamental theorem of arithmetic is one of those topics in mathematics that somehow ‘falls through the cracks’ in a student's education.When asked to state this theorem, those few students who are willing to give it a try (most have no idea of its content) will say something like ‘every natural number can be broken down into a product of primes’. The fact that this breakdown always results in the same primes is viewed as ‘obvious’. The purpose of this paper is to illustrate with a number of examples that the ‘Unique Factorization Property’ is a rare property and the fact that the natural numbers possess this property is ‘fundamental’ to our understanding of this number system.