Sarah is attempting to find the height of a tree by using a mirror. By the laws of physics she knows that the angle of incidence is congruent to the angle of reflection (these are marked in red on the diagram). Explain why the two triangles are similar and if she knows her height and the distance from the mirror to her feet and also the distance from the mirror to the tree how could she calculate the height of the tree?

Sagot :

The two triangles are similar as the angle of incidence is equal to the angle of reflection because the light ray selects the shortest path to reach the destination.

What s an angle of reflection?

The angle of reflection is the angle between a reflected ray and the normal drawn at the point of incidence to a reflecting surface.

When light is reflected from a surface, then the angle of incidence is always equal to the angle of reflection, where the angles are measured from the path of the light to the normal to the surface at the point at which light strikes the surface. Therefore, the angle of incidence is congruent to the angle of reflection.

Learn more about angles on:

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