Question

Consider the equation:

Answer 1

Answers: a = 10, b = 0

(b can be anything you want as long as its not -4)

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Work Shown:

Note how ax+b looks really similar to mx+b. All that is different is the slope m is replaced with the letter 'a'.

On the left side, 10x-4 is in the form mx+b with m = 10 as the slope. If we made a = 10, then the slope of the right side would also be 10 and we'd have parallel lines as long as b is not -4.

If b = -4 along with a = 10, then we'd have 10x-4 on the right hand side. This leads to infinitely many solutions.

If b is anything but -4, and a = 10, then we have two parallel lines with no solutions since parallel lines never cross. I'm picking b = 0 since 0 is the easiest number to pick on. You can pick anything you want (as long as its not -4 of course) for the value of b.