Erdős Problem a Daythe open tracker

Erdős Problem #423

OPENdatabase updated 2025-08-31

No proof or disproof is known, and it isn't known whether a finite computation could settle it.

What the community database records, not our verdict. erdosproblems.com no longer shows statuses (why).

`IsConsecutiveBlockSum a k m` means that \(m\) equals the sum of at least two consecutive terms of the sequence \(a\), using indices from \(\{1, \ldots, k - 1\}\). That is, there exist \(i, j\) with \(1 \le i\), \(i + 1 \le j\), \(j \le k - 1\) such that \(m = a(i) + a(i+1) + \cdots + a(j)\).

The Hofstadter sequence (OEIS A005243): \(a(1) = 1\), \(a(2) = 2\), and for \(k \ge 3\), \(a(k)\) is the least integer \(> a(k-1)\) that equals the sum of at least two consecutive terms from \(\{a(1), \ldots, a(k-1)\}\). The sequence begins \(1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 8, 10, 11, \ldots\).

Erdős Problem 423 [Er77c, p.71; ErGr80, p.83]: Let \(a(1) = 1\), \(a(2) = 2\), and for \(k \ge 3\) let \(a(k)\) be the least integer greater than \(a(k-1)\) that is a sum of at least two consecutive terms of the sequence. What is the asymptotic behaviour of this sequence? It seems likely that \(a_n = n + o(n)\).
Statement as formalized in Formal Conjectures (Google DeepMind, Apache-2.0) · their label: research open · 5 further variants / known partial results in the Lean file. The authoritative wording is on erdosproblems.com/423.
Prizenone
Topicsnumber theory
Statement in LeanFormal Conjectures
Solution in Leanno
OEISA005243
Original pageerdosproblems.com/423
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Proved an elementary canonical descent forest and density-neutral recurrence for all holes; independently verified exactly 4,302 holes and all gap runs through \(2^{25}\), but the uniform multiplicity

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