I ask this in relation to ” /(x/y) ” = ” *(y/x) ”
My mathematical ignorance does not allow me to perceive exactly what it is that confuses me about these manoeuvres and so perhaps my question is vague.
I have no difficulty with it as a technique; as something through which I can put an expression, and out at the other end the right result will appear. What I am trying to understand is *why it works*, contrasted with remembering it as a kind of magical spell.
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**EDIT:**
It was very rewarding for me to read all of your comments. Thank you most kindly for enlightening me.
For those interested in the cause of my previous confusion:
The gaps in my understanding of going from y*x=z to y=z/x were definitions of the equal sign and division.
I can see now that I previously considered the = sign to mean «result» or «answer» in some sort of final sense, like a conclusion; I now see that it only states that this is equal to that.
Following this fundamental piece of knowledge, I can belatedly understand what an equation is. From there, via the definition of division as the opposite of multiplication, I can see that if I divide something while also multiplying it with the same number, these actions cancel each other out.
And so the magical spell between y*x=z and y=z/x is the logic above expressed mathematically as x/(y*x)=z/x.
In: 25
Since the left side is equal to the right side, if you perform the same operation to both sides, then both sides will remain equal. They’ll still be equal even if you replace any term with an equivalent term or expression.
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