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The Harmonic Series and the nth Term Test for Divergence

History and Overview 2007-06-19 v1

Abstract

The divergence of the harmonic series is proved by direct comparison with a series whose nth partial sum telescopes to the natural logarithm of n. The key idea is to apply the classical inequality x>=log(1+x) (valid for x>-1) with x=1/k and sum over k, 1<=k<=n-1.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.0706.2513,
  title  = {The Harmonic Series and the nth Term Test for Divergence},
  author = {David M. Bradley},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0706.2513},
  year   = {2007}
}
R2 v1 2026-06-21T08:39:19.383Z