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Offline miotatsu

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Trig is confusing me
« on: April 10, 2010, 02:41:42 am »
okay so
a graphing calculator can take an angle and return an answer based on a trig function amirite?
like you can do sin(45 on a ti-84+ homescreen and it returns the sin of a 45 degree angle correct?
If that is correct i am really confused, because i just learned about sin/cos/tan in school and apparently they are just side/angle relationships of a triangle
for instance sin is supposed to be
Code: [Select]
opposite side/hypotenusebut if you only are inputting an angle then how on earth does it know what the opposite side AND the hypotenuse are?!?!

i really want to figure this out because until i do i will never be able to understand trig. ;.;

« Last Edit: April 10, 2010, 02:43:54 am by miotatsu »
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Offline cooliojazz

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Re: Trig is confusing me
« Reply #1 on: April 10, 2010, 02:44:35 am »
It doesn't.  It knows the ratio between them.
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Offline miotatsu

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Re: Trig is confusing me
« Reply #2 on: April 10, 2010, 02:45:59 am »
OH, that makes a lot more sense, but i don't fully get it yet
nvm, i fully understand it now :O
« Last Edit: April 10, 2010, 03:08:45 am by miotatsu »
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Offline mapar007

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Re: Trig is confusing me
« Reply #3 on: April 10, 2010, 03:09:58 am »
Trigonometry is far more than just right-triangle-calculations. ;)

(strange... We learned this really early on at school. You're older than me, so...)
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Offline meishe91

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Re: Trig is confusing me
« Reply #4 on: April 10, 2010, 03:14:48 am »
I can try to explain some later, if I manage to think of how to word it all haha, but Builderboy wrote a tutorial about trig here so that might help in the mean time. I really need some sleep so I'll try coming up with something tomorrow for ya :)
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Offline Quigibo

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Re: Trig is confusing me
« Reply #5 on: April 10, 2010, 03:18:57 am »
You use the unit triangle.  That means the hypotenuse has length 1.  In such a triangle, the side opposite to the angle is the sin of the angle and the side adjacent is the cosine.  That's why the identity sin^2+cos^2=1 because its just the Pythagorean theorem of that triangle.
« Last Edit: April 10, 2010, 03:20:18 am by Quigibo »
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Offline meishe91

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Re: Trig is confusing me
« Reply #6 on: April 10, 2010, 03:47:46 am »
Ya, the Unit Circle is a huge part of Trig.
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