Wolfram Alpha's solution to $\lim_{x\to 0+} \frac{\ln\ x}{x^2}$

184 Views Asked by At

I was trying to compute the following:

$$\lim_{x\to 0+}\frac{\ln x}{x^2}$$

And it stumped me after doing the following work:

Applied the product rule for limits:

$$\lim_{x\to 0+}\frac{\ln x}{x^2} = \lim_{x\to 0+}\frac{1}{x^2}\bullet\lim_{x\to 0+} \ln x$$

$$\lim_{x\to 0+} \ln x = -\infty$$

$$\lim_{x\to 0+}\frac{\ln x}{x^2}= \lim_{x\to 0+}\frac{1}{x^2} \bullet -\infty$$

Now, for as to what to do here, I was stumped, and WolframAlpha did the following:

$$\lim_{x\to 0+}\frac{1}{x^2} = \lim_{x\to 0+}e^{-2\ln x}$$

And then, to my confusion, did this:

$$\lim_{x\to 0+}\frac{1}{x^2} = e^{\lim_{x\to 0+}-2\ln x}$$

And with that, proceeded to solve:

$$\lim_{x\to 0+}\frac{1}{x^2} = e^{-2\ \bullet \ -\infty}$$

$$\lim_{x\to 0+}\frac{1}{x^2} = \infty$$

For the final result:

$$\infty \bullet -\infty = -\infty$$

What I don't understand, however, is how

$$\lim_{x\to 0+}e^{-2\ln x} = e^{\lim_{x\to 0+}-2\ln x}$$

preserves equality. How is this justifiable? Is this always applicable?

1

There are 1 best solutions below

2
On

$\lim\limits_{x\rightarrow0}\frac{\ln{x}}{x^2}$ is absurd, but $$\lim\limits_{x\rightarrow0^+}\frac{\ln{x}}{x^2}=-\infty$$ because for $x\rightarrow0^+$ we have $\ln{x}\rightarrow-\infty$ by definition of $\ln$ and $\frac{1}{x^2}\rightarrow+\infty$.

Now we can use the definition of $\lim$ if you wish.