Then how many times you will walk that distance? Just as before $3$ times and in the end you'll be $6$ miles to the left of the origin so you'll be in the negative section.įinally, you'll have to try to picture what could $(-2)*(-3)$ mean. With the same example in mind, what would $-2*3$ mean? First, suppose that the $-2$ just specifies that you will have to walk left a distance of $2$ miles. But in the same way you can play this idea with a negative times a positive. Now you picture where you're at? Well, you're at the right of the origin so you are in the positive section. Then I will try to convey the idea that if you are multiplying two numbers (let's suppose they are integers to make things easier to picture) then a product as $2*3$ would just mean that you have to walk right (in the positive direction) a distance of $2$ (say miles for instance) three times, that is, first you walk $2$ miles, then another $2$ miles and finally another $2$ miles to the right. Well if I were to explain this in an intuitive way to someone (or at least try), I would like to think of an analogy with walking over the real line, by agreeing that walking left will be walking in the negative direction and walking right in the positive direction.

Negative minus negative equal positive