Joe Buhler just pointed out to me that in bases bigger than 3, that the number 22'1' requires 3 steps to get to a single digit, where the digit x' means (b-x), where b is the base. So, for example in base 10, the number 289 requires 3 steps. Victor On Wed, Nov 30, 2011 at 11:23 AM, Victor Miller <victorsmiller@gmail.com>wrote:
Great! I've heard that Richard Stong says he can prove an absolute bound of 3 for all bases, but I don't know his idea.
Victor
On Wed, Nov 30, 2011 at 10:58 AM, Warren Smith <warren.wds@gmail.com>wrote:
actually a more careful look at my nonrigorous argument last post suggests that in radix R, the number of steps needed is only O(logR).
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