What is the distance between #(3,-1,-5)# and #(4,-3,6)#?

1 Answer
Mar 4, 2016

I assume that you know the distance formula (square root of sum of corresponding coordinates squared)
Well, that formula can actually be EXTENDED to the third dimension. (This is a very powerful thing in future mathematics)
What that means is that instead of the known

#sqrt((a-b)^2 + (c-d)^2#

We can extend this to be
#sqrt((a-b)^2 + (c-d)^2 + (e-f)^2#

This problem is beginning to look a lot easier huh?
We can just plug in the corresponding values into the formula

#sqrt((3-4)^2 + (-1-(-3))^2 + (-5-6)^2#

#sqrt((-1)^2 + 2^2 + (-1 1)^2)#

This becomes #sqrt(1 + 4 + 121)#

Which is #sqrt(126)#

This is equal to #3sqrt(14)#

This cannot be simplified further, so we are done.