Sunday, October 23, 2016

limits - Intuition: Why will 3x always eventually overtake 2x+a no matter how large a is?



I have a few ways to justifiy this to myself.



I just think that since 3x "grows faster" than 2x+a, it will always overtake it eventually. Another way to say this is that the slope of the tangent of 3x will always eventually be greater for some x than that of 2x+a, so that the rate of growth at that x value will be greater for 3x, so at that point it's only a matter of "time" before it overtakes 2x+a.



Another way I think about it is that the larger x becomes, the closer the ratio x:(x+a) comes to 1, in other words limx(xx+a)=1, so that the base of the exponents is what really matters asymptotically speaking.




However, I'm still not completely convinced and would like to rigorize my intuition. Any other way of thinking about this would be very helpful, whether geometric (visual intuition is typically best for me), algebraic, calculusic...anything.



This came to me because I was trying to convince myself that b2x3x goes to 0 no matter how large b is, and I realized that b can be thought of as 2a, and that it might be easier to see this way, but if you have some intuition fo this form: b2x3x, I welcome it also.


Answer



3x<2x+a



3x<2x2a



3x2x<2a




1.5x<2a



x<log1.52a



$x

$x

x<1.8a




So no matter how large a is, when x is larger than 1.8a, 3x is larger than 2x.


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