# Square root of -1 [duplicate]

This question already has an answer here:

Hello stackexchange users! I am somewhat confused on $\sqrt{-1}$. I believe the answer should be no solution, or inconsistent, or at least something in that nature. Am I correct or am I most likely wrong? Any help or insight would be deeply appreciated

## marked as duplicate by GAVD, Lord Shark the Unknown, Nosrati, Krish, XamSep 23 '17 at 2:54

This question has been asked before and already has an answer. If those answers do not fully address your question, please ask a new question.

• Your answer is in the tags. – Parcly Taxel Sep 23 '17 at 1:53
• Could you please clarify? – NerdOfCode Sep 23 '17 at 1:54
• Just look up imaginary and complex numbers on Wikipedia. – Parcly Taxel Sep 23 '17 at 1:54
• I asked this question on math.stackexchange.... I wasn't really looking for imaginary and complex numbers on Wikipedia. I simply wanted some clarification as you can see in my question. – NerdOfCode Sep 23 '17 at 1:56

## 1 Answer

if you consider all polynomials to have roots you can ask what is the root of x^2+1 well it turns out that this is only 0 when x =sqrt(-1) so imagine we have a value, i ,for the x that solves it. you can ask what set it's in but positive*positive=negative * negative = positive, so no positive or negative number works. to make sure all polynomials have roots you need to invent imaginary numbers.