Question

THEIR AGES

If you add the square of Tom's age to the age of Mary the sum is 62; but if you
add the square of Mary's age to age of Tom, the result is 176. Can you say
what are the ages of Tom and Mary?

Answer 1

Tom’s age is 7 years

Mary’s age is 13 years

Explanation:

Since we do not know the ages, let’s represent the ages by variables at first.

Let m represent mary’s age will t represent Tom’s age.

Now, let’s proceed to have equations.

Adding square of Tom’s age (t^2) to mary’s age give 62

t^2 + m = 62 •••••••(i)

Adding square of mary’s age (m^2) to Tom’s age give 176

m^2 + t = 176 •••••••(ii)

Now, to get the individual ages, we will need to solve both equations simultaneously.

Solving both equations simultaneously without mathematical softwares can be a little hard.

By the use of mathematical software ( wolfram alpha to be specific), we can input both equations and allow the software to solve.

By inputing these equations, we have the values of t to be 7 and m to be 13

And if we try to check by inspection, we can see that these values are actually correct.

7^2 + 13 = 62

13^2 + 7 = 176