Imaginary Numbers i Before we talk about imaginary numbers, let's talk about exponents. 10⁰ =1 10¹=10 10²=100 10³=1,000 10⁴=10,000 10⁵=100,000 Notice something? The small number on top, called an exponent, tells us how many times we multiply a number. For example, 10⁴ or 10^4 is basically saying 10*10*10*10(which is 10,000). The opposite of an exponent is a root. Instead of multiplying several times, you see what number times itself equals a certain number. For example, the square root of 4 is 2, since 2*2 is 4. The cube root of 27 is 3 because 3*3*3 is 27. The fourth root of 1 is 1 since 1*1*1*1 is 1. For the answer to be correct, each number must be the same. That means you can't have 2*(-2) or 2*3. It has to be the same number. When it comes to the square root of negative numbers there are no answers. Why? If you can multiply two numbers together to get a negative product, your equation will be negative times a positive. The problem is that these numbers are not the same....
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