An architect drew the sketch below while designing a house roof. The dimensions shown are for the interior of the triangle. What is the value of cos x?
Because the triangle is isosceles, constructing a perpendicular from the top vertex to the opposite side will bisect the base and create two smaller right triangles. In a right triangle, the cosine of an acute angle is equal to the length of the side adjacent to the angle divided by the length of the hypotenuse. This gives cosx=16/24, which can be simplified to cos=2/3.