What is tangent?

Answer 1

1. Making contact at a single point or along a line; touching but not intersecting.

2. Mathematics -- The trigonometric function of an acute angle in a right triangle that is the ratio of the length of the side opposite the angle to the length of the side adjacent to the angle.

3. A sudden digression or change of course: went off on a tangent during the courtroom argument.

4. Music -- An upright pin in a keyboard instrument, especially in a clavichord, that rises to sound a string when a key is depressed and stops the string at a preset length to set the pitch.

Answer 2

Tangent
In mathematics, the word tangent has two distinct but etymologically-related meanings: one in geometry and one in trigonometry.

Tangent (geometry)
In plane geometry, a line is tangent to a curve, at some point, if both line and curve pass through the point with the same direction. Such a line is called the tangent line (or tangent). The tangent line is the best straight-line approximation to the curve at that point. The curve, at point P, has the same slope as a tangent line passing through P. The slope of a tangent line can be approximated by a secant line. It is a mistake to think of tangents as lines which intersect a curve at only one single point. There are tangents which intersect curves at several points (as in the following example), and there are non-tangential lines which intersect curves at only one single point. (Note that in the important case of a conic section, such as a circle, the tangent line will intersect the curve at only one point.) It is also possible for a line to be a double tangent, when it is tangent to the same curve at two distinct points. Higher numbers of tangent points are possible. In the following diagram, a red line intersects the black curve at two points. It is tangent to the curve at the point indicated by the dot.

Tangent (trigonometry)
In trigonometry, the tangent is a function (see trigonometric function) defined as

tanθ = sinθ/cosθ

The function is so-named because it can be defined as the length of a certain segment of a tangent (in the geometric sense) to the unit circle. It is easiest to define it in the context of a two-dimensional Cartesian coordinate system. If one constructs the unit circle centered at the origin, the tangent line to the unit circle at the point P = (1, 0), and the ray emanating from the origin at an angle θ to the x-axis, then the ray will intersect the tangent line at most a single point Q. The tangent (in the trigonometric sense) of θ is the length of the portion of the tangent line between P and Q. If the ray does not intersect the tangent line, then the tangent (function) of θ is undefined.

Answer 3

A tangent to a circle is a line that touches the circle at only one point
The point where the tangent touches the circle is known as point of contact.
There can be infinite tangents to a cicle but only one tangent at a particular point on the circumference of the circle.
A tangent is perpendicular to the radius through the point of contact..

Answer 4

Or a tangent is a line that only touches a curve at one point.

Answer 5

Tangent = o/a (opposite angle over adjacent angle)

Answer 6

imagine a ball on the floor..the floor is tangential..to the ball

or mathematically a tangent to a function is given by dy/dx and a point..
it means...finding a line which has a slope dy/dx...
if u know calculus.

if u dont know calculus..just think of blades of a fan which is wet...the water ll b coming out in the direction which is tangential to the rotation of the fan...i.e it is perfectly parallel to the curve at that point

Answer 7

tangent on any curve is the straight line which touches the curve only at one point.

Answer 8

tangent on any curve is the straight line which touches the curve only at one point.

Answer 9

definitiontion tangent is directly proportional to opposite side of angle and inversely proportional to adjacent side
by formula:
TanØ=o/a
where:o opposite side
a adjacent side

i hope this will help you

Answer 10

tan = length of the side opposite to a known angle divided by length of the adjacent side to a known angle

used in right triangles ONLY