Bookmark and Share

Notice: On April 23, 2014, Statalist moved from an email list to a forum, based at statalist.org.


[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

st: Why the square of a negative number is still negative


From   "Tiago V. Pereira" <[email protected]>
To   [email protected]
Subject   st: Why the square of a negative number is still negative
Date   Fri, 16 Dec 2011 14:31:31 -0200 (BRST)

Dear statalisters,

Can someone explain why is this happening?:

local x = -2
*/Approach A:
dis (`x'^2)*(5)
*/Approach B:
dis (`x'*`x')*(5)
*/Approach C:
 dis ((`x')^2)*(5)


My output is:

. dis (`x'^2)*(5)
-20

. */Approach B:

. dis (`x'*`x')*(5)
20

. */Approach C:

.  dis ((`x')^2)*(5)
20


Do I need vacations? (Am I forgetting something very simple from
mathematics?)

All the best,

Tiago


*
*   For searches and help try:
*   http://www.stata.com/help.cgi?search
*   http://www.stata.com/support/statalist/faq
*   http://www.ats.ucla.edu/stat/stata/


© Copyright 1996–2018 StataCorp LLC   |   Terms of use   |   Privacy   |   Contact us   |   Site index