Learning about finding the slope of a line

[RuroumiKenshin]

What I meant was that if you were to teach me math in the context of physics, I would better understand it.

 

[22-16]

If you have a line that has points on it but it is too hard to calculate rise over run because the results you have are obscure (for instance the line of best fit in an experiment), then this is a simple formula that I found on http://richardbowles.tripod.com:

[sum]X.[sum]Y - N.[sum]XY over ([sum]X)2 - N.[sum]X2

 

[HallsofIvy]

A day or so ago you hadn't any idea what a slope was and now you're asking about dy/dx? How about just taking it slowly and actually LEARNING each topic well before going on to the next?

(I notice that after not understanding the responses you got on this board, you complained that your teacher was "not good at explanations". I see a tendency to jump at ideas then complain about any explanation that does not verify your preconceptions.)

In any case, dy/dx has nothing to do with "infinite slopes". A straight line has a fixed slope (another way to calculate the slope it to take the tangent of the of the angle the line makes with any horizontal line). A curve does not have a "slope" but we can draw a tangent line to the curve and find its slope. That is dy/dx.