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Find lim_f(x) if f(x) =

x-5
lim f(x) =
x-5
-x²-1, x = 5
-3.
X = 5

Find lim_f(x) if f(x) = x-5 lim f(x) = x-5 -x²-1, x = 5 -3. X = 5-example-1
User Tadpole
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1 Answer

5 votes

For simplicity let's adopt the notion that is limit is the value that the function approaches as x approach a number. There is a more crisp definition but this suffices for our purposes.

So even though f(5) is -3 by the definition above that doesn't matter. The limit doesn't have to be -3 if it isn't continuous.

Now I'm gonna plug in 5 into the expression -(x^2)-1 even though the function isn't defined at 5.

-(5^2)-1 = -26 which is not equal to -3

Since -(x^2)-1 is continuous, we can conclude that the graph of the piecewise function is smooth most of the way but jumps up at x=5 and then conforms back to the original behavior.

So the limit is just -26 because all we care about is the behavior that exists near x=5.

User Miradulo
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