Positive Integer is Sum of Consecutive Positive Integers iff not Power of 2/Mistake/First Edition

Source Work

1986: David Wells: Curious and Interesting Numbers:

The Dictionary

$2$

Mistake

An integer is the sum of a sequence of consecutive integers if and only if it is not a power of $2$.

The property stated holds only for positive integers.

Otherwise, trivially, we would have:

$2 = -1 + 0 + 1 + 2$

What it ought to say is:

A positive integer is the sum of two or more consecutive (strictly) positive integers if and only if it is not a power of $2$.

This mistake has been partially corrected in David Wells: Curious and Interesting Numbers (2nd ed.).

A positive integer is the sum of two or more consecutive integers if and only if it is not a power of $2$.

Sources

• 1986: David Wells: Curious and Interesting Numbers ... (previous) ... (next): $2$