How do you solve $5 + absm = 1$ ?

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Answer 1 · 2015-07-04T18:15:42

There is no solution to this equation.

In order to have
$5 + absm = 1$ ,

we must have $absm = 1-5$ (Subtract $5$ on both sides)

But that means we need:

$absm = -4$

But the absolute value of a number is always positive or $0$ ,

so there is no number whose absolute value is $-4$ .

How do you solve 5 + absm = 15 + absm = 1?