I've been asked the following question: The golden section method is to be applied to a unimodal function to find the minimum in the domain $[0,2]$. Given we require the error not be greater than $\epsilon=0.005$ how many iterations do we need to perform? I've been told to assume $r_k=0.382$ as the symmetric interval subdivision.
Is there something I'm missing here? How am I meant to calculate the error without being supplied a function? Perhaps it is something about the function being unimodal but I'm lost any hints appreciated. Does the fact it's unimodal mean I don't actually need the functional value to assess my next range of values?
Hint: Check the algorithm. The golden section search reduces the interval known to contain the minimum by a fixed factor each iteration. You don't need the function to answer.