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More thoughts on numbers
Nov. 2nd, 2015 04:17 pmThe other night, as I was trying to fall asleep, my thoughts turned to how big a a googolplex really is. A googol is 10^100 (a ten followed by one hundred zeros) and a googolplex is 10^10^100 (a ten followed by a googol zeros). This number is so large it exceeds, by a substantial margin, the estimated number of elementary particles in the observable universe. In fact there is not enough room, it is thought, in the universe to write out a googolplex in long form; and no one person could do it.
I then thought not even a googol number of seconds have passed since the "Big Bang", some 15 billion years ago.
Some quick math showed that there are 31,557,600 (~31.6 Million) seconds in a year. Some more multiplication showed that there only are 473,364,000,000,000,000 (~473.4 quadrillion) seconds in 15 billion years. That is a four followed by only 17 places; not even close to even one hundred places.
I would hazard a guess that from the time from the "Big Bang" to the end of the universe, from heat death or the "Big Crunch", not even a googol seconds will have passed, and definitely nowhere close to a googolplex seconds.
I then thought not even a googol number of seconds have passed since the "Big Bang", some 15 billion years ago.
Some quick math showed that there are 31,557,600 (~31.6 Million) seconds in a year. Some more multiplication showed that there only are 473,364,000,000,000,000 (~473.4 quadrillion) seconds in 15 billion years. That is a four followed by only 17 places; not even close to even one hundred places.
I would hazard a guess that from the time from the "Big Bang" to the end of the universe, from heat death or the "Big Crunch", not even a googol seconds will have passed, and definitely nowhere close to a googolplex seconds.
