Question from stackexchange
How many significant figures are there after 96
is correct to 1 significant figure?
From this statement:
It is given that the approximated number of elastic in a box is 100. If the number is correct to 1
significant figure, what is the smallest possible number of elastic?
Answer: 100
How would one express this in $x \pm y$ notation?:
All x in 100 <= x <= 149 gets mapped to $1 \times 10^2$ = 100.
How to express this in $x \pm y$ notation?
I would have supposed $100 \pm 49$, because 51..149 gets rounded to 100,
but then the statement from the correct answer will be violated:
"smallest possible number is 100".
Significant "numbers" is not significant "figures"! In any case, "96 correct to 1 significant figure" means that it has been rounded to the "ones" place. And that means the number can be anywhere from 95.5 to 96.5. [tex]x= 96\pm 0.5[/tex].