Young Gauss and the sum of the first n positive integers

Carl Friedrich Gauss was one of the most prolific mathematicians of all time. In fact,  he was considered by many as the “Prince of Mathematicians” because of his numerous contributions in different fields of mathematics.

Gauss displayed his genius at an early age. According to anecdotes, when he was in primary school, he was punished by his teacher due to misbehavior.  He was told to add the numbers from 1 to 100. He was able to compute its sum, which is 5050, in a matter of seconds.

Old Gauss

Now, how on earth did he do it? » Read more