The English Oracle

Is there a word for opposite numbers?

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Chapters
00:00 Is There A Word For Opposite Numbers?
00:22 Accepted Answer Score 23
00:38 Answer 2 Score 5
01:05 Answer 3 Score 3
01:47 Thank you

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Tags
#wordchoice #terminology #numbers #mathematics

#avk47



ACCEPTED ANSWER

Score 23


It's called the additive inverse.

In a less technical context, you could just call them negatives of each other.

Similarly, 5 and 1/5 are multiplicative inverses.




ANSWER 2

Score 5


This is hardly mainstream English, but there is a term.

The identity element under addition for the set of reals (or the set of integers) is zero;

x + 0 = 0 + x = x

The element that must be added to any element to give the identity element as the product (the general term for result of a binary operation; here the sum) is, for addition, known as the additive inverse of that element (number).




ANSWER 3

Score 3


As noted by Barmar, additive inverse is the technically correct term, but in your context, you could use the following phrase:

There's an issue with records that contain values that differ only in their sign. For example, -100 and +100.

You could also say:

There's an issue with records that contain values that have equal magnitude but opposite sign. For example, -100 and +100.

I have read both these in various textbooks written by American authors. You could pick one of these alternatives, or a similar variant, depending on your audience.