Question

Mason is weighing his dog on a scale that has increments of 0.1 kilograms (kg). He measures his dog's weight as 35.7 .How should Mason express his dog's weight, including the uncertainty?

Answer 1

`35.7\pm0.05kg`

1) Consider that Maison's scale has some level of uncertainty, by a 1/10 of a kg. And that uncertainty can be expressed this way:

`\begin{gathered} 50\%\: up\: =+0.5*(1)/(10)=0.05 \\ 50\%\: down\: =-0.5*(1)/(10)=0.05 \end{gathered}`

Since the level of uncertainty is given in tenths of kilograms, and we don't know whether this will increase or decrease the weight of Mason's dog, a good approximation would be to express this way.

2) Therefore, Mason can express the weight of his dog as:

`35.7\pm0.05kg`

Since this uncertainty can increase or decrease the weight of his dog.