Analyzing the Setup
Imagine you are standing before a grid of numbers, a 16×16 square where every point (x,y) is a potential candidate for our relation R. The relation is governed by the elegant linear equation:
Our mission is to find the points that lie on this line within the set M={1,2,…,16} and determine the minimum number of 'mirror' points required to make the relation symmetric.
Decoding the Equation
To find our points, we first isolate y:
Because y must be an integer within our set M, the numerator 5x−3 must be divisible by 4. Using algebraic intuition, we observe:
Since 4x is always divisible by 4, the condition for y to be an integer is simply that (x−3) must be a multiple of 4. Consequently, the possible values for x in our set M are 3,7,11, and 15.
The Search for Valid Pairs
Now, let us test these values to identify the valid coordinates (x,y):
For
x=3:
y=45(3)−3=3⇒(3,3)
For
x=7:
y=45(7)−3=8⇒(7,8)
For
x=11:
y=45(11)−3=13⇒(11,13)
Since 18 is outside our set M, we must reject the pair (15,18). Thus, our relation R is defined as:
The Symmetry Challenge
A relation is symmetric if, for every (x,y)∈R, the reverse pair (y,x) is also in R. We can visualize this as reflecting points across the line y=x.
For the point (3,3), the mirror image is (3,3), which is already present in R. However, for the point (7,8), the mirror image (8,7) is missing.
Similarly, for the point (11,13), the mirror image (13,11) is missing. To make R symmetric, we must add these two specific pairs to the set.
Therefore, the minimum number of elements to add is 2.