Basic L'Hôpital's rule

Calculus Level 1

lim x 0 sin x x = ? \large\lim_{x \to 0} \dfrac{\sin x}{x} =\, ?


The answer is 1.

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3 solutions

Chew-Seong Cheong
May 19, 2016

I suppose Svatejas Shivakumar 's suggestion is as follows:

lim x 0 sin x x = lim x 0 ( 1 x ( x x 3 3 ! + x 5 5 ! . . . ) ) Expand into Maclaurin series = lim x 0 ( 1 x 2 3 ! + x 4 5 ! . . . ) = 1 \begin{aligned} \lim_{x \to 0} \frac{\color{#3D99F6}{\sin x}}{x} & = \lim_{x \to 0} \left( \frac{1}{x} \color{#3D99F6}{\left(x-\frac{x^3}{3!} + \frac{x^5}{5!} - ... \right)} \right) \quad \quad \small \color{#3D99F6}{\text{Expand into Maclaurin series}} \\ & = \lim_{x \to 0} \left(1-\frac{x^2}{3!} + \frac{x^4}{5!} - ... \right) \\ & = \boxed{1} \end{aligned}

Taylor's series nice (+1)

Ashish Menon - 5 years ago
Ashish Menon
May 18, 2016

Let f ( x ) = sin x f(x) = \sin x and g ( x ) = x g(x) = x . at x = 0 x = 0 , f ( x ) = sin 0 = 0 f(x) = \sin 0 = 0 and g ( x ) = x = 0 g(x) = x = 0 . So, f ( x ) = g ( x ) = 0 f(x) = g(x) = 0 . Now, f ( x ) = cos x f'(x) = \cos x and g ( x ) = 1 g'(x) = 1 . Therefore lim x 0 f ( x ) g ( x ) \lim_{x \to 0} \dfrac{f'(x)}{g'(x)} exists which is equal to 1 1 . So, applying L'Hôpital's rule. lim x 0 sin x x = 1 \lim_{x \to 0} \dfrac{\sin x}{x} = \boxed{1} .

There should not be a degree sign there......

展豪 張 - 5 years ago

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Haha thanks I changed it.

Ashish Menon - 5 years ago

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Haha nice! There is still one on the last line. Btw, I think that L'Hopital's rule should not be used when dueling with this limit because when we are computing derivative of sine function by first principal, we usually have to make use of this limit and this leads to a circular reasoning......

展豪 張 - 5 years ago

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@展豪 張 Aw thanks!

Ashish Menon - 5 years ago

Easier method is to use the Taylor series of sin(x).

. .
Mar 28, 2021

lim x 0 sin x x = lim x 0 sin x ° = sin 90 ° = 1 \displaystyle \lim _ { x \to 0 } \frac { \sin x } { x } = \lim _ { x \to 0 } \sin x \degree = \sin 90 \degree = 1 .

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