how would i do this?

Question

Determine which two equations represent perpendicular lines A. y=7x-6 B. y=1/7x+6 C. y=-1/7x+6 D. y=1/7x-6

Answer 1

Perpendicular lines have slopes which are negative reciprocals of each other. Furthermore, their y-intercepts are not equal. In other words, given m is the slope of one line, then the slope, m', of its perpendicular line is -(1/m). So, if y = mx + b is the equation of the first line, then y = m'x + b' = -(1/m)x + b' , where b' does not equal b, represents the equation of the line perpendicular to the first line.

Looking at the possibilities, A and C are the only two equations which fit the requirements described above. In equation A, m = 7, and in equation C, m' = -(1/m) = -1/7. If we choose equations B or D, their slopes are 1/7. The equation of a line perpendicular to either of them then must have a slope equal to -7. None of the other equations have that slope, so B and D are out. Notice too that equations A and C have different y-intercepts, or b values, which is what you would expect of perpendicular lines.

The answer to your question then is A and C.

Answer 2

The slope intercept form of a line is:

y = mx + b

y is the vertical measurement (sometimes called dependant variable)
x is the horizontal measurement (sometimes called independant
variable)
m is the slope (the change in the y divided by the change in x which
is sometimes expressed as rise over run)
b is the y-intercept

I advise you to put any linear equation into this format so that you
can then use some standard rules and tools to get your answers. Thus
if you had a problem like:

3y = 5/3x - 8

you would rewrite it to read (by dividing by 3):

y = 5/9x - 8/3

Now let's tackle the easiest part of the problem, which is finding the
x and y intercepts. My math teacher taught us what he called the
Watergate method (for obvious reasons as you will see). The method
goes like this:

To find the y-intercept:

1) Take your hand (or finger or whatever) and cover-up the x term
(that is mx). (The cover-up is the reason for the name
Watergate.)

2) The solution is y = b (x = 0).

Note this works because with x = 0, we have mx = 0 and thus y = b, and
since the y intercept is the value of y when x = 0, we are done.

To find the x-intercept:

1) Take your hand (or finger or whatever) and cover-up the y term
(that is just y this time).

2) We have 0 = mx + b.

3) Thus solving for x we have x = -b/m.

Note this works because with y = 0, we have step (2), and the
x-intercept is the value of x when y = 0 so again we are done.

Thus in the problem above we have:

y = 5/9x - 8/3
y-intercept = b = -8/3
x-intercept = -b/m = (8/3)(9/5) = 24/5

Now the next easiest thing is getting a parallel line. Actually,
since we know how to get the intercepts, we can get the parallel lines
just as easily. Note that all parallel lines have the same slope.
This makes sense because both lines must increase the same amount in y
for a given change in x or at some point they would meet (this is easy
to convince yourself of by drawing some lines on a piece paper).

Now if you draw a bunch of parallel lines, you will notice the only
difference between them is where they intercept the x or y axis. So by
changing, say, the y-intercept, you can create a new parallel line.
We know that the y-intercept is b in our equation so to get a parallel
line you just need to change b.

Example of line parallel to y = 5/9x - 8/3:

y = 5/9x - 1

Now say you wanted a line parallel through a point (a bit trickier but
still no problem). You are given (x1,y1) and you need to find a b1
for which y1 = mx1 + b1 is valid. Thus you can solve for b1 and you
get:

b1 = y1 - m(x1)

Example line parallel to y = 5/9x - 8/3 through (9,1):

b = 1 -5/9(9) = -4
y = 5/9x -4

Okay, now you need to know how to find perpendicular lines also.
Even more fun. This relies on the neat property of slopes that the
product of the slopes of two perpendicular lines is -1. The easiest
way I know to prove this involves some higher math that you don't want
to deal with at the moment (no reason to muddy the waters) but you can
see that this makes sense by the following:

1) Draw two perpendicular lines on a blank sheet of paper (no axis
please - we are going to rotate the paper to compare slopes).

2) We shall agree that all lines are drawn left to right regardless
of the up/down motion.

3) Thus we have that lines are drawn UP if they start in the lower
left and go to the upper right. Note these lines will have
positive slopes (the y value increases as x increases).

4) Similarly, lines that are drawn DOWN (upper left to lower right)
have negative slopes (the y values decrease if x increases).

5) Note that a negative times a positive must be a negative, so we
know from (3) and (4) that the products of the slopes must be
negative.

6) Rotate the paper in front of you. You will notice that as one
line gets steeper (large change in y for a given change in x),
the other line gets shallower (small change in y for a given
change in x). This indicates that the slopes are inversely
proportional. In other words, the product of the slopes of the
lines should be a constant regardless of how you rotate the
paper.

7) So far, we have that the product of the slopes should be a
negativeconstant. To see why the constant is -1, do the
following. Turn the paper so that the lines are at a 45 degree
angle with the horizontal (it should look like an x). Now the
slopes are 1 and -1 for this case. We have noted that the slopes
are a constant regardless of the rotation [i.e., the product of
the slopes gives the same answer for our 45 degree case as for
any other rotation angle (except for a constant line y = 0 and
x = 0, since x = 0 is not allowed in math)]. Since the product in
this case is -1, it must hold for the other cases. As I
indicated earlier, while this does not prove it (the proof is
beyond the scope of this discussion) it helps you to see that it
is true.

Now, using this you can get a perpendicular line by the following:

let your first line be y = m1x + b1
you want a line y = m2x + b2 that is perpendicular

Solve by using the fact that the product of the slopes is -1:

m1(m2) = -1
m2 = -1/m1

Then if you want the line to go through a particular point (x1,y1),
you can find b2 by (similar to the parallel case):

y1 = m2x1 + b2
b2 = y1 - m2x1
= y1 + x1/m1

If you do not have to go through a particular point, pick any number
for b2 (I suggest b2 = 0).

As for general graphing and writing the tables to graph form, I
suggest the following:

1) Pick equally spaced numbers usually centered on the origin to use
as your x values. Try to pick them so your calculations are easy
(i.e., for a slope of 1/3 values of -3,0,3,6,... would be great).

2) Make a table that looks like x | y and put the x values
-------------- in the left column
|
|
|

3) For each value in the x column, calculate y = mx + b for y (i.e.,
you know m, x, and b) and put this in the y column (this can be
simplified in linear equations by noting that by multiplying the
change in x times the slope and adding it to the previous value
you will get the new value, see example below).

4) When you are done with the table, just plot the points and
connect the dots.

Example: y = 2/3 x - 4

1) I pick -3,0,3,6,9

2) x | y
----------------
-3 |
0 |
3 |
6 |
9 |
3) x | y
----------------
-3 | 2/3(-3) -4 = -6
0 | 2/3(0) - 4 = -4 (or -6 + 2/3(0--3) = -6 +2 )
3 | 2/3(3) - 4 = -2 (or -4 + 2/3(3-0) = -4 +2 )
6 | 2/3(6) - 4 = 0 (or -2 + 2 )
9 | 2/3(9) - 4 = 2 (or 0 + 2 )

So you have:
x | y
----------------
-3 | -6
0 | -4
3 | -2
6 | 0
9 | 2

Answer 3

well, we know that perpendicular lines have opposite slopes. first you need to determine the slopes of each of the lines using the equation "y=mx+b", where m= the slope
A. slope = 7
B. slope = 1/7
C. slope = -1/7
D. slope = 1/7

just by looking at the slopes alone, you can actually determine an answer. 1/7 is not the opposite of 7, however, -1/7 is the opposite of 7. we know this because -1/7 is a slowly decreasing slope, while 7 is a positive slope moving at an increasing rate.

Answer 4

you graph them, its very simple, like for d you go down -6 and then go up one and over 7 i think, im learning it in 8th grade