00:01
Okay, so for this problem, we are asked to solve for the value of x given that the absolute value of 3x equals 18.
00:09
So first what we're going to do is talk about absolute value really quick.
00:13
And when you have an absolute value, all that means is that distance of that number from zero.
00:20
Or in other words, the magnitude of that number.
00:22
So, for example, if we have the absolute value of negative 3 and we look at a number line and here's zero and here negative 3, negative 2, negative 1, well we can count that we're 1, 2, 3 spaces away from 0.
00:39
And then if we do the absolute value of positive 3, start with 1, 2, 3, and again, we're 3 spaces from 0.
00:48
So the absolute value of negative 3 is equal to 3, and the absolute value of positive 3 is also 3.
00:56
So these are actually all equal to each other.
01:00
So now that we did a little review of what absolute value means, let's go back to this equation.
01:06
So we have 3x equals 18.
01:08
So we just established that you can have negative values inside of the absolute value and still get a positive number.
01:16
So let's consider what could be the total inside of these parentheses.
01:21
So the absolute value of 18 is equal to 18.
01:24
So we'll start with one equation over here...