A ship extends 27 feet above the water and 27 feet below the water. Suppose you toured the entire ship. Write an absolute value inequality that represents all the distances you could have been from the water line.

Question

anonymous · Answer

I'm not 100% sure on this, but...

it seems to me you can't go higher than 27 feet up or 27 feet down.

so if x is your position in feet either above (positive) or below (negative) the water line...

x must be <27   AND x > -27

meaning, less than 27 feet above and higher than 27 feet below.  In other words, x is between -27 and 27, and when you talk about "how far from the water line", you are really asking for the actual distance... you don't care about whether it's up or down.... so it's an absolute value

That expression is    |x| <= 27