Ever wondered how ancient Greeks figured out the lengths of shadows?
Ever wondered how ancient Greeks figured out the lengths of shadows?
Imagine you're standing next to a tall building and need to find out its height without climbing it.
Picture a right triangle formed by the building, its shadow, and the distance from the building to the shadow's tip. The Pythagorean theorem helps us understand the relationship between these sides.
Example
If the shadow is 4 meters long and the distance from the building is 3 meters, the theorem helps us find the building's height.
Remember this
The theorem tells us that the square of the building's height plus the square of the shadow's length equals the square of the distance from the building to the shadow's tip.
Text adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
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