Quote:
Originally posted by MiMiLamb
'lkk;'kj don't Doc me! and What is the chain rule it's not on the paper
Also, how do you know which rule to use? And how do you even use the rule? All I see is just a messy clump of numbers and letters
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The only rules where you really need to memorize anything are just the product rule and the quotient rule. The others should come very intuitively if you do a couple easy exercises.
For (2x^3+3)(x^4 - 2x): You don't need the chain rule, just the product rule. You derive (2x^3+3), multiply by (x^4-2x) and then you add the derivative of (x^4-2x) multiplied by (2x^3+3).
You should try deriving the two components by themselves first. For example, to derive 2x^3+3, you know that the derivative of a constant (in this case 3) is just 0, so you're left with the derivative of 2x^3, for which you use the power rule.