Is there any way to enter tetration in WolframAlpha, in such a way that I can use it with the limit function? More specific, can I make Wolfram Alpha calculate the limit of sqrt(2)^sqrt(2)^sqrt(2)^sqrt(2)^… You get it? And i know it will be 2, i just wanted to ask for the general case.
This can be seen as a FixedPoint[], after looking into what Mathematica makes out of it
In[27]:= Sqrt[2]^Sqrt[2]^Sqrt[2]^Sqrt[2]^Sqrt[2]^Sqrt[2] // FullForm
Out[27]=Power[2,Power[2,Plus[-1,Power[2,Plus[-1,Power[2,Plus[-1,Power[2,Plus[-1,Power[2,Rational[-1,2]]]]]]]]]]]
and keeping in mind that
In[18]:= ((((Sqrt[2]^Sqrt[2])^Sqrt[2])^Sqrt[2])^Sqrt[2])^Sqrt[2] // N
Out[18]= 7.10299
diverges, one finds the expression to reach the fixed point is
In[30]:= 2^FixedPoint[Power[2, Plus[-1, #]] &, Sqrt[2.]]
Out[30]= 2.
which can - to return to the question - be entered into W|A. Note
In[31]:= FixedPoint[Power[2, Plus[-1, #]] &, Sqrt[2.]]
Out[31]= 1.
to no surprize.
Slightly off-question but I think this can help. I actually did some research on tetration (and extending it to complex realms) some weeks ago and I learnt the following through this Wolfram MathWorld page.
The value of the infinite power tower
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can be computed analytically by writing
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Taking the logarithm of both sides and plugging back in to obtain
![]()
Solving for h(z) gives
![]()
.
Where W(z) is the Lambert W-function (Corless et al. 1996). h(z) converges iff e^(-e)<=x<=e^(1/e) (0.0659<=x<=1.4446; OEIS A073230 and A073229), as shown by Euler (1783) and Eisenstein (1844) (Le Lionnais 1983; Wells 1986, p. 35). This function is already in mathematica with the following name:
ProductLog[x]
Just to prove it works:
I don’t know what things you’re working on but probably this method will be more efficient than solving for the limit manually. Hope it helped ![]()
Observe - despite this argument has a weakness if repeated - that (because of \infty-1=\infty) one might single out one term \sqrt2 from a=Sqrt[2]^Sqrt[2]^Sqrt[2]^... coming to
In[1]:= Solve[Sqrt[2]^a == a, a]
Out[1]= {{a -> 2}, {a -> -((2 ProductLog[-1, -(Log[2]/2)])/Log[2])}}
One can enter solve sqrt(2)^x=x and obtain a result from W|A. It seems that W|A will not handle the more general case of a^x=x, though Mathematica is fine with it.
In[63]:= Solve[a^x == x, x]
During evaluation of In[63]:= Solve::ifun: Inverse functions are being used by Solve, so some solutions may not be found; use Reduce for complete solution information.
Out[63]= {{x -> -(ProductLog[-Log[a]]/Log[a])}}
This does not fully address the question since it is a multivalued result, so one must figure out which case is correct for the limit problem at hand.
