Question 379494: This problem has totally boggled my mind!! Help???
Essay; show all work. Consider that the age, x, of a unicorn in human equivalent years can be given by the formula (x) = - 0.001518x4 + 0.097326x3 – 1.3367x2 + 12.46x + 2.914. When a unicorn is 2.5 years old, what is its age in human equivalent years? What about when it is 12 years old? Is it similar to a dog’s approximation of multiplying by 7 to get the age in human equivalent years? Why or why not?
Answer by richard1234(7193)   (Show Source):
You can put this solution on YOUR website! I'd have to say this is a poorly written problem, I'll explain why at the end (is the problem from a textbook?). It is quite simple to evaluate the function f(x) at x = 2.5, 12; just replace in all the x's with those numbers and evaluate (Sorry, I don't have my TI-Nspire with me).
It is not the same as approximating a dog's age as the two equations have different degrees.
The fallacy with this problem is: Suppose the unicorn's age approaches infinity. By taking a limit (you'll learn limits in calculus), the limit of f(x) as x approaches infinity is negative infinity, since the coefficient of the largest exponent is negative. In other words, if the age of a unicorn is some arbitrarily large number (in unicorn years), its age in human years will become a negative number.
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