What's a billion?
The next time you hear a someone use the word billion in a casual manner, think about ...
A
billion is a difficult number to comprehend, but one advertising agency
did a good job of putting that figure into some perspective in one of
its releases.
a.. A billion seconds ago it was 1959.
b.. A billion minutes ago Jesus was alive.
c.. A billion hours ago our ancestors were living in the Stone Age.
d.. A billion days ago no-one walked on the earth on two feet.
e.. A billion dollars ago was only 8 hours and 20 minutes, at the rate our government is spending it.
**I got this in an email and thought I would share it because it's intriguing.**
Zayda posted on Oct 29, 2006
| views: 225
Comments
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silverwhisper said on Oct 29, 2006....
alas, i miss carl sagan.
ed
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quidnunc said on Oct 29, 2006....
interesting! thank you for sharing this one, z!
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moonriver said on Oct 29, 2006....
Why are people so heated up about this billion thingy? What about zillion, huh? Nobody's talking about zillions. I searched Google and Wikipedia left and right, up and down, inside out, but no clear definition of a zillion. Maybe you should also post fun facts about the zillion.
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silverwhisper said on Oct 29, 2006....
zillion isn't an actual number though. billion, trillion, quadrillion, quintillion, those are legitimate actual numbers. zillion, not so much.
ed
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Zayda said on Oct 29, 2006....
and i wouldn't call this being heated up...
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Zayda said on Oct 30, 2006....
[borrows Silver's trout]
[trout smacks Scaly]
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silverwhisper said on Oct 30, 2006....
but do you trout-smack him a billion times? :>
ed
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bloc said on Oct 30, 2006....
sw implied it, but I'll make it clear. This is from a carl sagan essay, not an ad agency. I highly recommend his books!
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moonriver said on Oct 30, 2006....
Gotcha silverwhisper. Scalywag, my guess is that bazillion is maybe 10x or 100x that of a zillion. And my research and gut feel tell me that gazillion is 1,000x a zillion. But the key is to find the zillion. I'm sure Carl Sagan knew all these, but he kept them a secret, like the solution to Fermat's last theorem, for later math wizards like us to discover ourselves. I'm writing a paper on it for submission to my university's math society. I'll call it the Moonriver conjecture, and find sponsors for an international conference to resolve the issue.
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Zayda said on Oct 30, 2006....
Yes, Bloc, it's from a carl sagan essay but it was used in an advertising campaign. I remember seeing the ads, but for the life of me can't remember for what...meh...and that's what the email was referring to. Most people who see the ads don't know that it's from a Sagan essay.
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bloc said on Oct 30, 2006....
I just wanted people to be aware of him and his books :)
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MissMimi said on Oct 30, 2006....
SW, you made me laugh. :DI've been alive over a billion seconds! Put like that, it's pretty impressive. ;)