An unsolved problem: a simple sequence

An unsolved problem: a simple sequence

A simple sequence has been puzzling the smartest mathematicians for almost a century, since it was proposed by Collatz in 1937. It is also known as Collatz Conjecture. The sequence is simply defined as
$$a_n=\{\begin{array}{ll}{a}_{n-1}/2& \text{if }{a}_{n-1}\text{ is even}\\ 3\ast a_{n-1}+1& \text{if }{a}_{n-1}\text{ is odd}\end{array}$$
We can start with any natural numbers to calculate the sequence. For example, let’s start with a₀=10, we can get a sequence (10, 5, 16, 8, 4, 2, 1). You can try some other numbers with the python code below.

def collatz(a):
	if a % 2 == 0:
		return int(a / 2)
	else:
		return 3 * a + 1

a = 27
print(a)
while (a > 1):
	a = collatz(a)
	print(a)

You may realize that the last number is always 1. In general, no matter which natural number we start with, we can always come to the cycle (4, 2, 1). In other words, we can always end with 1. This is the Collatz Conjecture.

The following table gives us some simple sequences starting with the first simple numbers.

a0	a0, a1, a2, …
1	1
2	2, 1
3	3, 10, 5, 16, 8, 4, 2, 1
4	4, 2, 1
5	5, 16, 8, 4, 2, 1
6	6, 3, 10, 5, 16, 8, 4, 2, 1
7	7, 22, 11, 34, 17, 52, 26, 13, 40, 20, 10, 5, 16, 8, 4, 2, 1
8	8, 4, 2, 1
9	9, 28, 14, 7, 22, 11, 34, 17, 52, 26, 13, 40, 20, 10, 5, 16, 8, 4, 2, 1
10	10, 5, 16, 8, 4, 2, 1

27 is a magic number for us to start with. If we start with 27, we can get a long sequence (27, 82, 41, 124, 62, 31, 94, 47, 142, 71, 214, 107, 322, 161, 484, 242, 121, 364, 182, 91, 274, 137, 412, 206, 103, 310, 155, 466, 233, 700, 350, 175, 526, 263, 790, 395, 1186, 593, 1780, 890, 445, 1336, 668, 334, 167, 502, 251, 754, 377, 1132, 566, 283, 850, 425, 1276, 638, 319, 958, 479, 1438, 719, 2158, 1079, 3238, 1619, 4858, 2429, 7288, 3644, 1822, 911, 2734, 1367, 4102, 2051, 6154, 3077, 9232, 4616, 2308, 1154, 577, 1732, 866, 433, 1300, 650, 325, 976, 488, 244, 122, 61, 184, 92, 46, 23, 70, 35, 106, 53, 160, 80, 40, 20, 10, 5, 16, 8, 4, 2, 1). Is it interesting?

Although it’s easy and obvious to calculate the simple sequence, we don’t have any convincing proof yet until today.

Many mathematicians try to find a counterexample by using modern computers. Till now, the natural numbers from 1 to 19*2⁵⁸(5,476,377,146,882,523,136) have been calculated, and no counterexample has been found yet.

The numbers of the sequence is also called hailstone numbers, because a hailstone goes up and down in the cloud, and finally falls to the ground.

Because of the difficulty in proving the problem, some mathematician commented that “mathematics is not yet ready for such problems”. We don’t know when we will prove the problem. Maybe you are the one who prove it.