I had the following thought when I was trying to fall asleep the other day:

The prime numbers 2 and 5 have the property that when a number is formed
by concatenating an integer from 1 to infinity with the prime, the
number is always composite (for 2: 12, 22, 32, 42, ... 102, 112, ...;
and for 5: 15, 25, 35, 45, ...). Using "||" as a concatenation
operator, then this can be expressed as: If p is the prime and n is in
the set of integers from 1 to infinity, then n||p is composite. For
most primes, some of the numbers in the set formed by concatenation
would be composite and some would be prime. For example, for 11: 111 is
composite, 211 is prime, 311 is prime, 411 is composite, etc. Are there
primes other than 2 and 5 in which all the numbers would be composite?

--
Carl G.

--
This email has been checked for viruses by AVG antivirus software.
www.avg.com

In article <tp9pft$37ug2$1@dont-email.me>,
Carl G. <carlgnewsDELETECAPS@microprizes.com> wrote:

> Are there primes other than 2 and 5 in which all the numbers would be
> composite?

No, by Dirichlet's theorem on primes in arithmetic progression, which
says that if a and d are coprime integers then there are infinitely many
primes of the form a+nd.

Your sequences have this form: e.g., 111, 211, 311, 411, ... is 11+100n.

Any prime other than 2 or 5 is coprime to that 10^k term, and so the
sequence will have many primes in it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dirichlet%27s_theorem_on_arithmetic_progressions

Gareth

For your reference, records indicate that
"Carl G." <carlgnews@microprizes.com> wrote:

> I had the following thought when I was trying to fall asleep the other day:
>
> The prime numbers 2 and 5 have the property that

they are factors of 10. I think anything beyond that is numerology.

It’s like realizing that the digits for multiples of 9 add up to multiples of 9.

--
"Also . . . I can kill you with my brain."
River Tam, Trash, Firefly

In article <tpchci$3j024$1@dont-email.me>,
Doc O'Leary , <droleary.1022@2022.subsume.com> wrote:

>> I had the following thought when I was trying to fall asleep the other day:
>>
>> The prime numbers 2 and 5 have the property that

>they are factors of 10. I think anything beyond that is numerology.

That explains why they have that property, but shows nothing about
the case for other digits, which is a much more interesting problem.

-- Richard

For your reference, records indicate that
richard@cogsci.ed.ac.uk (Richard Tobin) wrote:

> In article <tpchci$3j024$1@dont-email.me>,
> Doc O'Leary , <droleary.1022@2022.subsume.com> wrote:
>
> >> I had the following thought when I was trying to fall asleep the other day:
> >>
> >> The prime numbers 2 and 5 have the property that
>
> >they are factors of 10. I think anything beyond that is numerology.
>
> That explains why they have that property, but shows nothing about
> the case for other digits, which is a much more interesting problem.

I disagree. There’s nothing to “show” for other digits. It’s just math,
and/or a quirk of our common base-10 representation. I mean, feel free
to explore a 3 * 7 = base-21 system to see what “interesting” things may
hold true. Nothing wrong with finding new ways to count sheep. :-)

--
"Also . . . I can kill you with my brain."
River Tam, Trash, Firefly

In article <tpg4dd$3ek8$1@dont-email.me>,
Doc O'Leary , <droleary.1022@2022.subsume.com> wrote:

> I disagree. There’s nothing to “show” for other digits. It’s just
> math, and/or a quirk of our common base-10 representation. I mean,
> feel free to explore a 3 * 7 = base-21 system to see what
> “interesting” things may hold true. Nothing wrong with finding new
> ways to count sheep. :-)

It may be just maths, but it's interesting and challenging maths! For
all primes other than 2 or 5, the sequence described contains infinitely
many primes and infinitely many composites.

Yes, the "other than 2 or 5" bit is to do with our number base being 10.
If you worked in base 21 then it would be "other than 3 or 7".

As for something to show, it's answering what the original question
asked.

Gareth