Got a math ? for all of you smart people out there

[paintballrulzs]

Myself and a few of my friends have been thinking about the whole x/0 is undefined. It logically doesn't make sense. Take 5 for example. 5/1 is of course 5. 5/(1/2) is 10, 5/(1/4)=20, etc. The closer you get to 0 the bigger the value gets. Another example would be slope. The slope of a vertical line is considered undefined but logically it keeps increasing. Our theory is, I don't know if this has already been said any where, that anything divided by 0 is infinite. It has been drilled into our heads that anything divided by 0 is undefined but i just dont buy it.

What do you guys think?

[Miscue]

c/x c=constant x=variable

Limit as x approaches 0... is infinity.

5/0 you can think not as 'infinity' but as... approaching infinity.

Only infinity = infinity...

Yes, it is undefined... but you can describe it in terms of limits.

[RTMAGBOY13]

yea thats a good question we are doin the same stuff in math its so easy

[paintballrulzs]

miscue.......ur right. Thanks.

[paintbattler]

about the slope thing..do you remember what it actually is? RISE/RUN..RISE is up and down and RUN is sideways..so therefore 2/0 go up 2 units and sideways 0 units so that makes it undefined.

[Miscue]

Yeap, you got it. That's why vertical line has undefined slope. See, easy huh?

[Bigzamboni]

Next time on "Miscue's Math Minute": The quadratic equation...

[BTAutoMag]

Originally posted by paintbattler
about the slope thing..do you remember what it actually is? RISE/RUN..RISE is up and down and RUN is sideways..so therefore 2/0 go up 2 units and sideways 0 units so that makes it undefined.

well he said that a number divided by 0 is infinate and i agree. which means that a vertical line with a 2/0 slope has an infinate slope.

[FutureMagOwner]

its not an infinant slope because it goes straight up and down not every direction which shows on a 2 dimentional scale 5/0 is impossible however in 3d 5/0(i know you would need something for Z) would fill a whole plane which is still not infinity

[Miscue]

It's not infinity... it "approaches" infinity... there's a difference.

Originally posted by BTAutoMag


well he said that a number divided by 0 is infinate and i agree. which means that a vertical line with a 2/0 slope has an infinate slope.

[MantisMag]

think about it this way.
10/5=2
2*5=10
multiplication and division are related.

10/0=?
0*1=0
0*100=0
0*100000000=0
0*any number=0
so what's the answer? what makes the answer 10? sure a number divided by a smaller and smaller positive number gets bigger and bigger. but as soon as it hits zero the answer becomes undefined because there is no answer.

[ntn4502]

-b+or-square root of b(squared) -4(a)(c)
--------------------------------
2(a)

I saw somebody say something

[animal]

LIMITS!

Ahh yes... good ole calculus coming back to haunt me :)

I liked your first non-simpified answer Miscue :)

It was prolly just some mathematician from the 1600's who decided it was too tedious to write a proof for so he just whipped out "limits". And after seeing how to prove something like addition, I can't say I blame him :)