Three Trigonometry Functions.

Geometry Level 5

This is an easy one. What is the value of:

cos ( tan ( sin ( 1 ° ) ) ) \cos{(\tan{(\sin{(1°)})})}

Try my Other Problems

n = 0 31415 0.2 2 [ 10 9 ] n \sum _{ n=0 }^{ 31415 }{ \frac { 0.2 }{ 2{ \left[ \frac { 10 }{ 9 } \right] }^{ n } } } None of the above 1

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1 solution

Julian Poon
Oct 7, 2014

The answer is very close to ( 1 1 ) but it isn't ( 1 1 ). If you got tricked by your calculator, see bottom.

Now, ( 1 ° ) is a really small angle. Visualize the triangle corresponding to ( s i n ( 1 ° ) sin(1°) ). The hypotenuse is almost equal to the adjacent, making ( s i n ( 1 ° ) sin(1°) ) almost, but is not \textbf{not} , equal to ( 0 0 ).

Then, ( t a n ( s i n ( 1 ° ) ) tan(sin(1°)) ). You can use the above method to find that t a n ( near zero ) tan(\textbf{near zero}) is also near, but not \textbf{not} ( 0 0 ).

Similarly, you can do the same: c o s ( near zero ) cos(\textbf{near zero}) and find that it equals very closely to ( 1 1 ) but it isn’t \textbf{isn't} ( 1 1 ).

The very fancy looking summation thing is, when you work it out, just a very very close approximation of ( 1 1 ). You can easily tell that it is not the answer as it can be expressed in a closed form.

What your calculator is doing when it shows ( 1 1 ) is that, since t a n ( s i n ( 1 ° ) ) tan(sin(1°)) is so close to ( 0 0 ), your calculator just assumes that c o s ( t a n ( s i n ( 1 ° ) ) ) = 1 cos(tan(sin(1°)))=1

I didn't get tricked by my calc, I myself assumed it. Ah!

Kartik Sharma - 6 years, 7 months ago

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LOL. I actually laughed :D

Julian Poon - 6 years, 7 months ago

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