Factions or %s of People. When to round up or down?

[mateodude]

Does anyone know if there is a hard fast rule for computing fractions or %s of people (or anything that can only exist as a whole)?

For example, Q72 in OG11 Section 5.3. We are told to find 1/3 of 40 committee members, which is 13 1/3. I assumed that since it is not possible to have 1/3 of a person, round up. That was incorrect logic on my part. The answer is 13.

Is there a universal rule for problems such as this one? Perhaps where one is asked to find max/s or min/s of people using fractions of "whole only" objects? Or is it a case by case situation?

any help would be greatly appreciated

[kajcha]

I will suggest to evaluate the situation in the question.

E.g in this particular situation the Q asks what is the greatest no of members who could vote and still the resolution is passed... As you said it is 40/3 = 13 1/3. Now, if you round up the resolution will not be passed so you need to round down.

My 2 cents. hope this helps.

[wongee]

I remember this problem, the way to work with this is subjective to the problem. In terms of people the question asked what is the most - so technically we have only half of the next person which isnt humanly possibly, so u have to go with whatever 'whole people' you can get, so the fraction/decimal is brought down.