How many positive real solutions are there of the above equation?
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Squaring both sides:
x 2 + 2 x + 1 = 1 + x 1 + ( x + 1 ) 1 + ( x + 2 ) 1 + … x + 2 = 1 + ( x + 1 ) 1 + ( x + 2 ) 1 + …
which is the original equation with x replaced by x + 1 . This means that if x is a solution, then so is x + 1 . We can see that x = 0 is a solution by simple substitution in the original formula, hence every natural number is a solution. The answer is therefore infinitely many .