Hey, shouldnt the answer be this cannot be determined…
I watched the solution and Greg says its because there is the two values that are non zero distance from x, but… thats at ONE given time right?
With out one given time constraint, there is an infinite numbers of values that are non zero distance from x at any given time… for example, if x = 3, how many values are non zero distance from 3? well… looks like it could be infinite # of numbers to me? Am I tripping?
Change “a certain non-zero distance from x” to something more concrete like “a distance of 4 from x.”
If you like, you can also assign a specific value to x, such as 3.
The resulting question should then be phrased as:
How many numbers are exactly 4 units away from 3 on the number line?
yep that makes sense… I do still think the question itself should be reworded. Cause without the “exactly 4 units away,” , seems like there can be an infinite number of numbers that can be away from x. But given the question right now, the answer should be the realtionship cannot be determined. I’m not sure how to suggest this change…
Removing “exactly” really doesn’t change the meaning/answer.
How many numbers are 4 units from 3 on the number line?
I think you’re glossing over the “a CERTAIN non-zero distance” part. The distance (like how we arbitrarily chose 4 above) is fixed. If we call this fixed quantity y, then you’re really answering the question:
The number of values that are y units from x on the number line for any y > 0.
Since y is fixed, you can’t decide to randomly change its value mid-question. For instance, if you fix y to be 4, then you can’t just assign a new value to y like 2 or 3, which seems to be what you’re doing to get “infinity” as your answer.
