Integration! Odd functions! Even functions! Calculus Thinking!

A weird
problem!

Phil Petrocelli, mymathteacheristerrible.com

March 23, 2019

I tried so many things on and off for a few weeks on this one! Then I got my head straight and solved
it in what felt like a matter of minutes. I probably wrote too much for this one, but I wanted to
give my readers a sense of how, oftentimes, good problem solving consists of many twists and turns.
Sometimes, unexpected ”tries” at something can reveal ”hidden” details.

Question.

Integrate the following: 󰁝 2

1 + x2
dx
−2 1 + 2x

Solution.

1 Struggle ... then, breakthrough

Experienced Calculus practitioners notice a tough issue straight away: that 2x term in the denominator. Can be
a bad sign sometimes.
I think it’s best to start with a definition that I use with my students all the time:
Definition 1. Calculus Thinking

A problem-solving state of mind that we assume when a problem looks frightening at first blush:
We try to rephrase all or part of the problem in ways that are easier to recognize, that are more tractable,
easier to solve. This could - and usually does - involve terrifying algebra (or trig, or ...), but! It will
be worth it. The intuition and elegance that we show off in this process is the essence of Calculus
Thinking.

To be specific, Calculus Thinking is the main skill we employ when dealing with, say, indeterminate forms of limits
without L’Hôpital’s Rule, dealing with most nontrivial Integration problems, doing applications problems of all
types, etc. Its value cannot be understated, in my opinion. I’d go as far as to say that when we learn Calculus, we
must master Calculus Thinking: being in a place where we are able to take advantage of every math trick we’ve
ever learned, refreshed on every math trick we’ve forgotten, and being able to emply any of them to throw some
shapes around, in the interest of just seeing what happens.
So what does this have to do with this integral that we’re considering? Having a closer look, we notice that the
interval over which we’re integrating is symmetrical about the y-axis and includes the origin: x 󰂃 [−2, 2]. For me,
this changed my whole way of thinking around this problem once I asked myself if the odd or even nature of this
2
f (x) = 1+x
1+2x could help it be more tractable.

1
2 Odd and even functions, or, remember your Algebra II

2.1 Definitions

Definition 2. Even function

For any function f(x), if f (−x) = f (x), then the function is called even.

Corollary 1. Functions that are odd are sometimes described as having y-axis symmetry.

Common examples of even functions include polynomials of degree n (for even integers, n), cosine, absolute value.

Definition 3. Odd function

For any function f(x), if f (−x) = −f (x), then the function is called odd.

Corollary 2. Functions that are odd are sometimes described as having origin symmetry.

Common examples of odd functions include polynomials of degree n (for odd integers, n), sine, hyperbolic sine.

2.2 Speaking of Algebra II, rational functions suck

(Well, they’re unpleasant, anyway.) Calculus makes many things easier, sometimes generalizes topics, and makes
solutions to many things proceed in interesting ways. Except for rational functions. They still kinda suck. Too
many details to juggle. But, it’s part of the practice, as rational functions are still the domains of many relationships
in nature.

2.3 Some Calculus implications of oddness and evenness

If we think strictly of areas (and therefore integrals), there are interesting characteristics of both odd and even
functions:

Theorem 1. For any symmetrical interval I: x 󰂃 [−a, a] over which f is continuous, the integral of an odd function
is zero. That is: 󰁝 a
f (x) dx = 0
−a

This makes sense, if we think about it. For an odd function f (x), there are equal areas bounded by the curve
and the x-axis: one above, one below. These add up to give us zero. Try it with f (x) = sinx and any other odd
functions you know.

Theorem 2. For any symmetrical interval I: x 󰂃 [−a, a] over which f is continuous, the integral of an even
function is: 󰁝 a 󰁝 a
f (x) dx = 2 f (x) dx
−a 0

This makes sense, too. For an even function f (x), there are equal areas on either side of the y-axis: both above
or both below.

2
3 Is our integrand an odd function or an even function?

3.1 Test for odd

For our function to be odd, f (−x) = −f (x) has to hold:

?
f (−x) = −f (x)

1 + (−x)2 ? 1 + x2
=−
1 + 2−x 1 + 2x

1 + x2 ?
=
1 + 21x

1 + x2 ?
2x +1 =
2x

2x (1 + x2 ) ?
=
2x + 1

1 + x2 ?
2x · = (rewrite)
2x + 1

With a final rewrite, we see:

1 + x2 1 + x2
2x · ∕
= − (1)
1 + 2x 1 + 2x
So, our function, f (x), does not appear to be odd. Fair enough.

3.2 Test for even

For our function to be even, f (−x) = f (x) has to hold:

?
f (−x) = f (x)

1 + (−x)2 ? 1 + x2
=
1 + 2−x 1 + 2x

We can quickly borrow our results from (1), above. Left-hand side is the same, and right-hand side is only slightly
different (no minus sign for the whole fraction):
1 + x2 ? 1 + x2
2x · =
1 + 2x 1 + 2x
This is certainly not true either, so:
1 + x2 1 + x2
2x · ∕
= (2)
1 + 2x 1 + 2x

3
3.3 So. Not even. Not odd. Why did I even bother?

Simply put: because I could. And this is where Calculus Thinking comes in. There is an interesting result in (1):

1 + x2
f (−x) = 2x ·
1 + 2x

Which simply means:

f (−x) = 2x · f (x) (3)

3.4 Back to even and odd functions for a sec

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Even_and_odd_functions:

Theorem 3. Every function may be uniquely decomposed as the sum of an even and an odd function, which are
called, respectively, the even part and the odd part of the function.

Specifically:

f (x) = fe (x) + fo (x) (4)

where fe (x) is the even part of f (x) and fo (x) is the odd part of f (x). This has some interesting implications.
When f (x) is even, we know f (x) = f (−x), and we can also say that fo (x) is necessarily zero, i.e., f (x) has no
odd part; it’s solely even. So:

if : f (x) = fe (x)
then : f (−x) = fe (x) (substitution)

and:

2fe (x) = f (x) + f (−x) (add equations)

So:
1󰀅 󰀆
fe (x) = f (x) + f (−x) (5)
2

A similar process can be done for fo (x) and results in:

1󰀅 󰀆
fo (x) = f (x) − f (−x) (6)
2

Please prove for yourself that these satisfy (4).

To get really specific about what these results mean, consider:
󰁝 a 󰁝 a
f (x) dx = fe (x) + fo (x) dx
−a −a

4
Applying what we’ve learned so far, we can say:
󰁝 a 󰁝 a
f (x) dx = fe (x) + fo (x) dx
−a −a

󰁝 a
= fe (x) + fo (x) dx
−a

󰁝 a 󰁝 a
= fe (x) dx + fo (x) dx
−a −a

󰁝 a
=2 fe (x) dx + 0
0

So:
󰁝 a 󰁝 a
f (x) dx = 2 fe (x) dx (7)
−a 0

Quite an interesting result. So, we can say:

Corollary 3. to Theorem 3
To integrate any function, f(x) over a symmetrical interval x 󰂃 [−a, a] where f is continuous, all we have to do is
integrate the even component of f(x) – fe (x) – over the interval x 󰂃 [0, a] and multiply by 2.

So, we have the following:

󰁝 a 󰁝 a
f (x) dx = 2 fe (x) dx
−a 0

󰁝 a
1󰀅 󰀆
=2 f (x) + f (−x) dx (substituting fe (x) from above)
0 2

󰁝 a 󰁝 a
= f (x) dx + f (−x) dx (clean up and expand)
0 0

So, for any function f (x) integrated over x 󰂃 [−a, a] :

󰁝 a 󰁝 a 󰁝 a
f (x) dx = f (x) dx + f (−x) dx (8)
−a 0 0

It’s actually a substitution of sorts!

3.4.1 A Desmos workbook for even/odd decomposition of functions

To help with future problems, I made a Desmos workbook for decomposing functions into their even and odd
components: https://www.desmos.com/calculator/vsi3n8ej7l. All you have to do is replace f (x) with the
function you wish to decompose. fe (x) and fo (x) are calculated for you! Note that if your f (x) results in
fe (x) = 0, your function is strictly odd, that is, there is no even component. Similarly, for a function that is
strictly even, fo (x) will be zero.

5
4 Now we have everything needed to solve our integral

We want to integrate: 󰁝 2
1 + x2
dx
−2 1 + 2x
using our result, (8). We need f (−x) to do so, so recall our result from (3), above:

1 + x2
f (x) =
1 + 2x

f (−x) = 2x · f (x)

Thinking ahead to substituting, let’s choose to use a slightly different version of (8), namely:
󰁝 a 󰁝 a
f (x) dx = f (x) + f (−x) dx (just a rewrite of (8))
−a 0

Substituting, we have:
󰁝 2 󰁝 a󰀗 󰀘 󰀗 󰀘
1 + x2 1 + x2 x 1 + x2
x
dx = + 2 · dx
−2 1 + 2 0 1 + 2x 1 + 2x

󰁝 2󰀗 󰀘
1 + x2
= · (1 + 2x ) dx (factor the integrand)
0 1 + 2x

󰁝 2
= 1 + x2 dx (cancel and simplify! OMG!)
0

󰀘2
1
= x + x3
3 0

8
=2+
3

14
=
3

Done. Did NOT see that coming.

6
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