Gauss was an interesting guy...............no wonder i would stare at logarithm tables when i was like 14..............



To search for examples, the following formula is helpful: 1 + 2 + 3 + · · · + (n − 1) + n = n(n + 1) 2 . There is an amusing anecdote associated with this formula. One day when the young Carl Friedrich Gauss (1777–1855) was in grade school, his teacher became so incensed with the class that he set them the task of adding up all the numbers from 1 to 100. As Gauss’s classmates dutifully began to add, Gauss walked up to the teacher and presented the answer, 5050. The story goes that the teacher was neither impressed nor amused, but there’s no record of what the next make-work assignment