How do you evaluate: One minus a negative one-third?

Question

4841 views around the world

You can reuse this answer
Creative Commons License

Answer 1 · 2017-02-20T23:08:01

#1 - (-1/3) = 4/3#

Subtracting a negative quantity is the same as adding the corresponding positive quantity.

So:

#1 - (-1/3) = 1+1/3 = 4/3#

Answer 2 · 2017-02-20T23:08:39

Writing this in mathematical terms gives the expression:

#1 - (-1/3)#

To solve, we first need to make the #1# a fraction by multiplying by the appropriate form of #1# so it has the same denominator as the fraction:

#(3/3 xx 1) - (-1/3) ->#

#3/3 - (-1/3)#

Knowing minus a minus is a plus we can rewrite this as:

#3/3 + 1/3#

Now we can solve by adding the numerators over the common denominator:

#(3 + 1)/3#

#4/3#