Understanding Points of Discontinuity in Functions

  • Thread starter Thread starter disneychannel
  • Start date Start date
  • Tags Tags
    Discontinuity Point
disneychannel
Messages
48
Reaction score
0
What is the point of discontinuity?

ex. does x3+x/x have a point of discontinuity at x=0? if there is a discontiuity, is it it removable or not
 
Physics news on Phys.org
I'm assuming you mean (x3 + x)/x rather than x3 + (x/x).

Yes, there is a discontinuity at x = 0. The discontinuity is removable if the limit of this function as x approaches 0 exists and is finite.
 
Actually, the answer is the same whether it is (x^3+ x)/x or x^3+ (x/x).

More important than the answer is whether or not you UNDERSTAND the answer. disneychannel, do you see the difference between the functions f(x)= (x^3+ x)/x and g(x)= x^2+ 1. What do you get when you graph each one?
 
There are two things I don't understand about this problem. First, when finding the nth root of a number, there should in theory be n solutions. However, the formula produces n+1 roots. Here is how. The first root is simply ##\left(r\right)^{\left(\frac{1}{n}\right)}##. Then you multiply this first root by n additional expressions given by the formula, as you go through k=0,1,...n-1. So you end up with n+1 roots, which cannot be correct. Let me illustrate what I mean. For this...
Back
Top