Question

How do you simplify this?

Answer 1

Notice how the top is an addition of two cubes, namely x and 2.

You can rewrite the equation as:

$\frac{x^{3} + 2^{3}}{x + 2}$

Now, (a + b)³ can be simplified down to (a + b)(a² - ab + b²)
Following the same pattern, we get:

$\frac{(x + 2)(x^{2} - 2x + 4)}{x + 2}$
$= x^{2} - 2x + 4$