We are given a number line and we want to determine whether LN and MN are congruent. For two segments to be congruent, they must have the same length. This means that we want to find the distance between the points L and N and the distance between the points M and Q. Consider the given number line.
To find the distance between the points, we will first determine their coordinates using the Ruler Postulate.
Ruler Postulate
Every point on a line can be paired with a real number. This makes a one-to-one correspondence between the points on the line and the real numbers. The real number that corresponds to a point is called the coordinate of the point.
The distance between two points is the absolute value of the difference of their coordinates. Looking at the number line we can see that the coordinate of the point L is -8 and the coordinate of point N is 3.
