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Which of these measures could NOT be the lengths of the sides of a right triangle?

Which of these measures could NOT be the lengths of the sides of a right triangle-example-1
User Toom
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1 Answer

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4,10,16

Here, we want to select which of the lengths could not be that of a right triangle

For a set of three numbers to be the sides of a right triangle

They must obey the Pythagoras' theorem

With respect to the question, we can have it restated that the square of the biggest numbers equal the sum of the squares of the two smaller ones

This brings us to the concept of Pythagorean triple

These are three numbers that at any time will form the sides of a right triangle

The correct answer in this case is the first one because the square of 16 is not equal to the sum of the squares of 10 and 4

All other options have the square of the biggest side equal to the sum of the squares of the two smaller ones

User Ifyouseewendy
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