Function

Approximation
ABSOLUTE ERROR
RELATIVE ERROR

Notatio
ns

denotes the derivative of the function if is a

positive integer. If , the notation means the
function itself.

Example. Let . Then

and so .

and so .
and so

Factoria
l

We define and for any integer , we define

Examples.

Taylors Theorem With

Let be a Remainder
function such that is continuous on
the interval for . For any two numbers and in
the interval , we have

wher

e
an
d

The polynomial is called the order Taylor

polynomial of the function about the number .

The function is referred to as the remainder.

Because of the factor in the expression for we
expect this quantity to be small when is large.
Consequently, the Taylor polynomial is an
approximation for the function .

Example. Find the order 5 Taylor polynomial

of the function about the number .

Solution. We take successive derivatives of

the function up to the derivative:

Let us use the fifth order Taylor polynomial of

about to approximate .

By calculator, the true value of is about

0.1823215568.
So we see that our approximation is correct
up to the fourth decimal place.

The absolute error in the preceding example is

and the relative error is

If is the true value of a certain quantity and is

an approximation obtained by some means
such as measurement or computation, then we
define absolute error and relative error as
follows:

Absolute error

Relative error

Exercises. Find the Taylor polynomial of the

function with the specified order about the
given
number .

1.
,
2.
3.
4.
5.

Example of approximation. Imagine that we

have no calculator available and we would like
to estimate the value of .

Consider the function and determine the sixth

order Taylor polynomial of about the number .
Verify
that

Therefor
e,

You will agree that we can compute the given

expression by hand (without calculator) but for
convenience, let us use a calculator. Then, .

If we use our calculator to obtain , the value

given by the calculator is 1.648721271. The
absolute error is . The relative error is
0.000077%.

Error

Estimate
Let us recall the equation . Since is the true
value of the function at and is the
approximation to the true value, then the
absolute error is . But

It is known that there is a number between

and such that . This expression can be used to
estimate the error in approximating a function
by

the order Taylor polynomial .

Example. Find an approximation to using the

third order Taylor polynomial of about the
number . Estimate the absolute error.

The absolute error is at . Now, there is a number

such that

Therefore, our estimate of is in error not

exceeding 0.0026. By calculator, and the
absolute error is We see that this is not more
than 0.0026.