Question

A little while ago, a dolphin was swimming below sea level at -7 meters. Now the dolphin is jumping at 0.5 meters. What does this mean?

Answer 1

This means that the dolphin ascended 7.5 meters in total.

The sea level is 0.

We know that to start off with, the dolphin was seven meters under the sea level.

We also know that the dolphin jumped .5 meters above the sea level.

This is a matter of absolute value; we are looking to find total distance, not actual height (which we already know, .5). Therefore, we ignore the negative sign and instead regard how many places each measurement is away from zero, which is another way of saying absolute value.

Take a look at x.

| x |

The lines surronding x represent absolute value. With that in mind, I can show you the process:

| -7 | + | .5 | = 7.5

is the same as saying 7 + .5 = 7.5

Let me know if you have any questions, or if this helped you!