Linear Algebra and Its Applications, Review Exercise 1.9

Review exercise 1.9. Show a 2 by 2 system of equations (i.e., two equations in two unknowns) that has an infinite number of solutions.

Answer: One possibility is the following system:

$\setlength\arraycolsep{0.2em}\begin{array}{rcrcr}u&+&v&=&0 \\ 2u&+&2v&=&0 \end{array}$

corresponding to the matrix equation $Ax = 0$ where

$A = \begin{bmatrix} 1&1 \\ 2&2 \end{bmatrix}$

The solutions to this system include any $(u, v)$ where $v = -u$ .

NOTE: This continues a series of posts containing worked out exercises from the (out of print) book Linear Algebra and Its Applications, Third Edition by Gilbert Strang.

If you find these posts useful I encourage you to also check out the more current Linear Algebra and Its Applications, Fourth Edition, Dr Strang’s introductory textbook Introduction to Linear Algebra, Fourth Edition and the accompanying free online course, and Dr Strang’s other books.

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