Sunday 11 August 2013

logarithms - prove logarithmic function is big oh of non logarithmic function




I am having trouble knowing how to find out whether a given logarithmic function, |f(x)|, is an element of the set of all functions less than or equal to C * |g(x)| where g(x) is a non-logarithmic function for some C and k such that x > k.



For example:



Say I am trying to prove that:



|N log N| <= C * |N^3| for some C and k where x > k



A way to establish whether this statement is true would be to solve for C. If C is not a function of N, then the statement holds true. To better be able to divide f(x) by g(x) to get a useful value would be to increase f(x). If f'(x) is still less than C * g(x) then we can still divide it by g(x) to get a useful value for C that can help prove whether the initial statement is true.




My struggle is what do I do if I am comparing a logarithmic function to a non-logarithmic function? It seems like it would be extremely difficult to increase N log N in to something that can be divided by N^3. Is there a way to do this? I have been doing research on logarithms and have not, so far, been able to find a way to do this.


Answer



You could use limits to prove this, or you could prove it algebraically as follows:



For all $n \ge 1$,
$$n \le e^n$$
$$ \log n \le \log e^n$$
$$ \log n \le n$$
$$ n \cdot \log n \le n \cdot n^2$$

$$ n \log n \le n^3$$
Hence,
$$n \log n = O(n^3)$$


No comments:

Post a Comment

real analysis - How to find $lim_{hrightarrow 0}frac{sin(ha)}{h}$

How to find $\lim_{h\rightarrow 0}\frac{\sin(ha)}{h}$ without lhopital rule? I know when I use lhopital I easy get $$ \lim_{h\rightarrow 0}...