TERETINIC ACID. [Tunes:m:1r.] TERM (Algebra). A simple term in an algebraical expression means all that involves multiplication, division,and extraction of roots without addition or subtraction. Thus in the expression slab .
the terms are a'b'x', and Vab x'. But compound quantities are also called terms when they are put in such a form that additions and subtractions are subordinate to subsequent multiplication, division, or extraction. Thus, (a + b) + + (a' — bl) ry has two terms, (a +b), xe+a, and ).xy. If the form be altered into arc" + N/(al — sy, the expression then has three terms. Most frequently, however, there is one letter in powers of which the whole expression is arranged, and then all that involves any one power of this principal letter is a term.
Thus a+ bz+ er + has three terms, namely, a, (la + e)x, and ex'.
When one quantity is said to be expressed in terms of another, it generally means merely that the first is to be an explicit PCNCTION of the second. Thus, in x+ y=a, we have expressed x+y in terms of a :
deduce y=a — x, and we have y expressed in terms of a and x. This is the distinction between y being expressed in terms of x, and y being a function of x: if, for instance, y= a y is a function of x, but it is not expressed in terms of x, but of z; substitute for z its value, and y is then expressed in terms of x. It is to be remembered that by saying that a quantity is expressed in terms of x, it is not meant that x is the only letter which enters, but that no other letter if there be any, is a function of x. Thus, in the preceding, where we obtain y=a—x—x', y is expressed in terms of x if a be no function of x. But if a be a function of x, say x, then y is not expressed in terms of r, until the value of a has been substituted, giving