To find the answer to "What two numbers have a product of -200 and a sum of 138?" we first state what we know. We are looking for x and y and we know that x • y = -200 and x + y = 138.
Before we keep going, it is important to know that x • y is the same as y • x and x + y is the same as y + x. The two variables are interchangeable. Which means that when we create one equation to solve the problem, we will have two answers.
To solve the problem, we take x + y = 138 and solve it for y to get y = 138 - x. Then, we replace y in x • y = -200 with 138 - x to get this:
x • (138 - x) = -200
Like we said above, the x and y are interchangeable, therefore the x in the equation above could also be y. The bottom line is that when we solved the equation we got two answers which are the two numbers that have a product of -200 and a sum of 138. The numbers are:
-1.43437
139.43437
That's it! The two numbers that have a product of -200 and a sum of 138 are -1.43437 and 139.43437 as proven below:
-1.43437 • 139.43437 ≈ -200
-1.43437 + 139.43437 = 138
Note: Answers are rounded up to the nearest five decimals if necessary so the answers may not be exact.
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