a water tank containing 8000 gallons drains at a rate of 50 gallons per minute?

Question

what would the function for that be

Answer 1

well, there are many functions that could be written to model aspects of that situation

the most obvious one is probably the one that describes the amount of water in the tank as a function of time

so: f(t)=8000-50*t

at t=0, of course, it gives us f(t)=8000, meaning 8000 gallons in tank
f(150)=0, so the tank is empty after 150 minutes

f(20)=7000, so after 20 minutes there is 7000 gallons in the tank