There are 10 lamps in a hall. Each one of them can be switched on independently. Find the number of ways in wh

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Concept understanding — Geometric Progression

Geometric Progression: The Idea of Repeated Multiplication

Imagine you're folding a piece of paper in half. Start with thickness 1 unit. After one fold, thickness becomes 2. After two folds, thickness becomes 4. After three folds, thickness becomes 8. The sequence of thicknesses is:

1, 2, 4, 8, 16, ...

Notice the pattern: each term is obtained by multiplying the previous term by the same number (here, 2). That's the core intuition behind a geometric progression — you keep multiplying by a fixed number, step after step.

This is different from an arithmetic progression, where you keep adding a fixed number. Here, the growth is multiplicative, not additive. That's why geometric progressions grow (or shrink) much faster.

Precise Definition

A Geometric Progression (GP) is a sequence of numbers where the ratio of any term to its preceding term is constant. This constant is called the common ratio, denoted by $r$ .

If the first term is $a$ , then the sequence looks like:

a, \ ar, \ ar^2, \ ar^3, \ ar^4, \ \dots

Note

The common ratio $r$ can be any real number — positive, negative, or even a fraction. If $r$ is negative, the terms alternate in sign. If $0 < r < 1$ , the terms get smaller and smaller.

The $n$ -th Term

To find any term directly without listing all previous ones, use the formula:

T_n = a \cdot r^{\,n-1}

where $T_n$ is the $n$ -th term, $a$ is the first term, $r$ is the common ratio, and $n$ is the term number (starting from 1).

Example: For the paper-folding sequence, $a = 1$ , $r = 2$ . The 5th term is $1 \cdot 2^{5-1} = 2^4 = 16$ , which matches our list.

Sum of $n$ Terms

There are two cases, depending on whether $r = 1$ or not.

n

When $r = 1$ , every term is just $a$ , so the sum is simply $n \times a$ .

Why the formula works (intuition):

Let $S = a + ar + ar^2 + \dots + ar^{n-1}$ . Multiply both sides by $r$ : $rS = ar + ar^2 + \dots + ar^n$ . Subtract the first from the second: $rS - S = ar^n - a$ , so $S(r-1) = a(r^n - 1)$ , giving the formula above.

Sum of an Infinite GP

If the common ratio $r$ lies strictly between $-1$ and $1$ (i.e., $|r| < 1$ ), the terms get smaller and smaller, and the sum of all terms approaches a finite value:

S_\infty = \frac{a}{1 - r}, \quad \text{for } |r| < 1

Watch out

If $|r| \geq 1$ , the infinite sum does not exist (it diverges to infinity or oscillates without settling). Never apply the infinite sum formula when $|r| \geq 1$ .

Example: $1 + \frac{1}{2} + \frac{1}{4} + \frac{1}{8} + \dots$ has $a=1$ , $r=\frac12$ , so $S_\infty = \frac{1}{1 - 1/2} = 2$ . This matches the intuition that repeatedly halving a unit length eventually fills exactly 2 units.

Quick Reference Table

Property	Formula	Condition
Common ratio	$r = \dfrac{T_{n+1}}{T_n}$	Always
$n$ -th term	$T_n = a r^{n-1}$	Always

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The key idea is that each lamp has 2 independent states (on/off), so for 10 lamps the total number of illumination patterns is $2^{10} = 1024$ . However, the hall is "illuminated" only when at least one lamp is on, so we exclude the single case where all are off. The answer is $1024 - 1 = 1023$ .

Why this is a Geometric Progression problem — the intuition

When you have a set of independent switches, each with the same number of choices, the total number of combinations multiplies. That multiplication pattern — $2 \times 2 \times 2 \times \cdots$ — is exactly a geometric progression. For $n$ lamps, the number of ways to set them is $2^n$ . But the question asks for the number of ways the hall can be illuminated, which means at least one lamp must be on. So we subtract the one completely dark configuration.

Watch out

A common mistake is to forget that "all lamps off" does not count as illumination. The problem says "illuminated" — that means visible light. Zero lamps on gives no light, so it must be excluded.

Step-by-step solution

Each lamp is independent.

For a single lamp, there are exactly 2 possibilities: it is either ON or OFF. No other states exist.
Apply the multiplication principle.

For 2 lamps, the number of combinations is $2 \times 2 = 4$ . For 3 lamps, it's $2^3 = 8$ . In general, for $n$ independent binary switches, the total number of distinct configurations is $2^n$ .
$\text{Total configurations for } n \text{ lamps} = 2^n$
Plug in $n = 10$ . …

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Q.There are 101010 lamps in a hall. Each one of them can be switched on independently. Find the number of ways in which the hall can be illuminated.

Why this is a Geometric Progression problem — the intuition

Step-by-step solution

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Q.There are $10$ lamps in a hall. Each one of them can be switched on independently. Find the number of ways in which the hall can be illuminated.

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