If you imagine the two points on a grid, the difference between their x coordinates is 6 (9-3) and the distance between their y coordinates is 4 (|-2-2|).
In the Pythagorean theorem (a
, these would count for the values of a and b, respectively (the legs of the triangle).
So, to find the hypotenuse, which is the distance between the points, square 6 and 4 to get 36 and 16, and find their sum: 52. 52, therefore, is the hypotenuse squared. So, find the square root of 52 to get
, or ~7.2111 (exact form:
)
From this is derived the distance formula,
