How do you simplify #\frac { 5( 1- 4) } { 1- 8}#?

2 Answers
Oct 17, 2017

The answer is #15/7#.

Explanation:

Simplify within parentheses.

#5(-3)/(1-8)#

Simplify the denominator.

#(5(-3))/-7#

Simplify the numerator.

#-15/-7#

Cancel divide the fraction by #-1#.

The answer is #15/7#.

Simplification.

Explanation:

You can subtract #4# from #1# to get #-3#

# (5(-3))/(1-8)#

Then you can subtract #8# from #1# to get #-7#

#(5(-3))/-7#

Then multiply #5# and #-3# to get #-15#

#(-15)/-7#

since both the numerator and the denominator have a negative sign, we can cancel it out

#15/7#

There's your fractional answer. if you need a decimal answer just do some long division, and your answer should be #2.bar(142857)#.