In: Advanced Math
Numerical Analysis: Perform the steps of the secant method to approximate the first three positive roots of the transcendent equation x = sin (πx).

Iteration scheme under secant method is:

Starting with
for which
(so we definitely have a positive root here) we get the following
table of iterates:
| n | x_n | f(x_n) |
|---|---|---|
| -1 | 2.000000000 | 2.000000000 |
| 0 | 0.500000000 | -0.500000000 |
| 1 | 0.800000000 | 0.212214748 |
| 2 | 0.710610635 | -0.078367145 |
| 3 | 0.734718088 | -0.005508773 |
| 4 | 0.736540836 | 0.000176232 |
| 5 | 0.736484332 | -0.000000363 |
Note that this equation has exactly one positive real root as can be seen from the graph below:

So the only positive root is (approximately) 

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