Set a timer to count down 52! seconds (that’s 8.0658×1067 seconds)
Stand on the equator, and take a step forward every billion years When you’ve circled the earth once, take a drop of water from the Pacific Ocean, and keep going. When the Pacific Ocean is empty, lay a sheet of paper down, refill the ocean and carry on.
When your stack of paper reaches the sun, take a look at the timer. The 3 left-most digits won’t have changed. 8.063×1067 seconds left to go. You have to repeat the whole process 1000 times to get 1/3 of the way through that time. 5.385×1067 seconds left to go.
So to kill that time you try something else. Shuffle a deck of cards, deal yourself 5 cards every billion years.
Each time you get a royal flush, buy a lottery ticket. Each time that ticket wins the jackpot, throw a grain of sand in the grand canyon.
When the grand canyon’s full, take 1oz of rock off Mount Everest, empty the canyon and carry on. When Everest has been leveled, check the timer.
There’s barely any change. 5.364×1067 seconds left. You’d have to repeat this process 256 times to have run out the timer.
You had recently posted a quote to the effect that our children(?) will never have the freedoms we have had, or words to that effect. I can’t find it here or online. Could you repost it or quote it? I’d like to send it to my son. Thanks.
VanderleunSeptember 6, 2021, 11:31 AM
Here you go….
InquiringSeptember 6, 2021, 11:52 AM
Yes! Thanks. (PS: I lived in the CA Bay Area, 1977-2017. 40 years wandering in the wilderness 🙂 . Actually we mostly enjoyed the first 20 years or so. Before 2017, I couldn’t wait to get out. Got my chance in 2016-2017; moved to northern Texas. I still check CA and Bay Area news daily; still have family in CA. Have traveled the state of CA and can visualize you people there. I wish you well.)
PA CatSeptember 6, 2021, 10:49 AM
Geez, Gerard, don’t give the Democrats any more ideas about ways to increase the national debt.
EX-Californian PeteSeptember 6, 2021, 11:37 AM
Amazing video, Vanderleun. Very cool stuff.
Always Remember That You Are Absolutely Unique. Just Like Everyone Else!
BroKenSeptember 6, 2021, 1:36 PM
I remember some of the early scientific calculators had a factorial button and something like 70! would return an error. The calculator couldn’t contain the number even with scientific notation. But Graham’s Number is so amazingly huge that you have to get your head around a whole new way of writing numers to understand it. Powers of ten are just the beginning. Even then, of course, no one really does understand it. But it still isn’t infinity! You can always say, Graham’s Number plus one, or times two, or squared, or add a couple of arrows.
Some semesters, when I’m feeling a bit cranky and want to torment my undergraduates, I show them the decimal expansion of that lovely number, 52! Then I tell them they can get extra credit simply by writing out the number in words, e.g. 1492 is one-thousand, four-hundred, ninety-two. So now do 80,658,175,170,943,878,571,660,636,856,403,766,975,289,505,440,883,277,824,000,000,000,000. Hint: it ends with “…eight hundred twenty-four trillion.”
LenSeptember 6, 2021, 7:28 PM
Torment them further by saying this the U.S. debt by the time Biden is out of office!
MoiSeptember 6, 2021, 2:32 PM
Thanks for that video. Absolutely fascinating. Now when people look at me, roll their eyes and say ” You are one of a kind”, I can take it too heart. LOL
SisuSeptember 6, 2021, 3:59 PM
So, for all practical purposes I can not foresee the future, may have an effect on it, but basically I should control that which I receive some positive reinforcement from, hope for the best, know that the ending of Monty Python’s “Meaning of Life” is perhaps (more than) allegorical, Viktor Frankl may have simply stated what we all know but are afraid to admit, G-d is, and our individual and collective purpose is to defeat “chaos theory” (back to the “d-mned, mathematicians” and Eve) and that (“chaos theory”) is in reality satan but Christ brought order to the world and we’re just waiting on the “proof”. … Hit “send”. Mix more Martinis.
Mike Anderson, Thank you for that expansion but there’s one thing that looks like an error — you describe it as units of trillions, but trillions have 12 zeros, and there are only 10 factors of 5 in 52! I would expect two more non-zero numerals at the end and a number in the tens of billions. Not that a rounding error hurts anyone here.
GrizzlySeptember 6, 2021, 7:47 PM
@Daniel: In the expansion of 52!, yes, there are the ten multiples of 5, but then you have to consider that the factors 25 and 50 each are divisible by 5 *twice*, so in the prime factorization of 52!, the exponent of 5 is 12, not 10.
Daniel K DaySeptember 7, 2021, 9:23 AM
Grizzly, absolutely right, thank you. Mike, you’re doing just fine, the twelve zeroes are requisite.
Did I forget how to count? Those trailing (!) fifteen digits, 824,000,000,000,000, surely appear to have the requisite twelve zeroes, at least to my old itchy eyes. I’d hate to think I wasted my money on the latest version of Mathematica, which is a calculator par excellence.
GrizzlySeptember 6, 2021, 7:53 PM
I have to say that all that description of 52! seconds brought to mind the descriptions that the Hindus have for the very large epochs of time that feature in their religion. I’m not that well-versed in their religion, so perhaps someone else out there can tell me which is larger: 52! seconds, or the period of the “big cycle” in Hindu mythology in which everything repeats.
PA CatSeptember 7, 2021, 7:40 AM
Your comment reminded me of the Arthur C. Clarke short story, “The Nine Billion Names of God,” which is about Buddhist monks in Tibet rather than Hindus, but the plot does hinge on the consequences of hiring two engineers and a computer to travel to Tibet and print out all the billions of names for God: https://faculty.winthrop.edu/kosterj/WRIT510/readings/The%20Nine%20Billion%20Names%20of%20God.pdf
Clarke wrote the story in 1952, so he didn’t mention the possibility of 52! names of God, but it’s still a good SF story.
Yep you’re all unique but no matter how unique and special you are, I’m always delighted that I’m me instead of thee,
unless, of course, you’re in a sailboat with 4 or more knots blowing off the shore & I’m landbound.
Real World Address for Donations, Mash Notes and Hate Mail
Gerard Van der Leun
1692 MANGROVE AVE
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Who Am I? by Carl Sandburg
My head knocks against the stars.
My feet are on the hilltops.
My finger-tips are in the valleys and shores of universal life.
Down in the sounding foam of primal things I reach my hands and play with pebbles of destiny.
I have been to hell and back many times.
I know all about heaven, for I have talked with God.
I dabble in the blood and guts of the terrible.
I know the passionate seizure of beauty
And the marvelous rebellion of man at all signs reading “Keep Off.”
My name is Truth and I am the most elusive captive in the universe.
Duty, Beauty, Liberty, Country, Honor, Family, Faith — Plus a few simple easy to follow rules for guys
Men saw the stars at the edge of the sea
They thought great thoughts about liberty
Poets wrote down words that did fit
Writers wrote books
Thinkers thought about it
Take it where you find it
Can’t leave it alone
You will find a purpose
To carry it on
Mainly when you find it
Your heart will be strong
About it
Many’s the road I have walked upon
Many’s the hour between dusk and dawn
Many’s the time
Many’s the mile
I see it all now
Through the eyes of a child
Take it where you find it
Can’t leave it alone
You will find a purpose
To carry it on
Mainly when you find it
Your heart will be strong
About it
[Chorus]
Lost dreams and found dreams
In America
In America
In America
Lost dreams and found dreams
In America
In America
In America
And close your eyes
Leave it all for a while
Leave the world
And your worries behind
You will build on whatever is real
And wake up each day
To a new waking dream
Take it where you find it
Can’t leave it alone
You will find a purpose
To carry it on
Mainly when you find it
Your heart will be strong
About it
[Chorus]
Change, change come over
Change come over
Talkin’ about a change
Change, change
Change come over, now
Change, change, change come over
I’m gonna walk down the street
Until I see
My shining light
I’m gonna walk down the street
Until I see
My shining light
I’m gonna walk down the street
Until I see
My shining light
I’m gonna walk down the street
Until I see
My shining light
I see my light
See my light
See my shining light
I see my light
See my light
See my shining light
Gerard Van der Leun
Comments on this entry are closed.
I think I’ll stick to playing euchre.
You had recently posted a quote to the effect that our children(?) will never have the freedoms we have had, or words to that effect. I can’t find it here or online. Could you repost it or quote it? I’d like to send it to my son. Thanks.
Here you go….
Yes! Thanks. (PS: I lived in the CA Bay Area, 1977-2017. 40 years wandering in the wilderness 🙂 . Actually we mostly enjoyed the first 20 years or so. Before 2017, I couldn’t wait to get out. Got my chance in 2016-2017; moved to northern Texas. I still check CA and Bay Area news daily; still have family in CA. Have traveled the state of CA and can visualize you people there. I wish you well.)
Geez, Gerard, don’t give the Democrats any more ideas about ways to increase the national debt.
Amazing video, Vanderleun. Very cool stuff.
Always Remember That You Are Absolutely Unique. Just Like Everyone Else!
I remember some of the early scientific calculators had a factorial button and something like 70! would return an error. The calculator couldn’t contain the number even with scientific notation. But Graham’s Number is so amazingly huge that you have to get your head around a whole new way of writing numers to understand it. Powers of ten are just the beginning. Even then, of course, no one really does understand it. But it still isn’t infinity! You can always say, Graham’s Number plus one, or times two, or squared, or add a couple of arrows.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XTeJ64KD5cg
just for the #’s, give “Giving Up Darwin” a moment. Claremont Review of Books, Spring ‘19.
this suggestion brought to you by a pedestrian intellect.
Some semesters, when I’m feeling a bit cranky and want to torment my undergraduates, I show them the decimal expansion of that lovely number, 52! Then I tell them they can get extra credit simply by writing out the number in words, e.g. 1492 is one-thousand, four-hundred, ninety-two. So now do 80,658,175,170,943,878,571,660,636,856,403,766,975,289,505,440,883,277,824,000,000,000,000. Hint: it ends with “…eight hundred twenty-four trillion.”
Torment them further by saying this the U.S. debt by the time Biden is out of office!
Thanks for that video. Absolutely fascinating. Now when people look at me, roll their eyes and say ” You are one of a kind”, I can take it too heart. LOL
So, for all practical purposes I can not foresee the future, may have an effect on it, but basically I should control that which I receive some positive reinforcement from, hope for the best, know that the ending of Monty Python’s “Meaning of Life” is perhaps (more than) allegorical, Viktor Frankl may have simply stated what we all know but are afraid to admit, G-d is, and our individual and collective purpose is to defeat “chaos theory” (back to the “d-mned, mathematicians” and Eve) and that (“chaos theory”) is in reality satan but Christ brought order to the world and we’re just waiting on the “proof”. … Hit “send”. Mix more Martinis.
More detail here.
https://czep.net/weblog/52cards.html
Mike Anderson, Thank you for that expansion but there’s one thing that looks like an error — you describe it as units of trillions, but trillions have 12 zeros, and there are only 10 factors of 5 in 52! I would expect two more non-zero numerals at the end and a number in the tens of billions. Not that a rounding error hurts anyone here.
@Daniel: In the expansion of 52!, yes, there are the ten multiples of 5, but then you have to consider that the factors 25 and 50 each are divisible by 5 *twice*, so in the prime factorization of 52!, the exponent of 5 is 12, not 10.
Grizzly, absolutely right, thank you. Mike, you’re doing just fine, the twelve zeroes are requisite.
Did I forget how to count? Those trailing (!) fifteen digits, 824,000,000,000,000, surely appear to have the requisite twelve zeroes, at least to my old itchy eyes. I’d hate to think I wasted my money on the latest version of Mathematica, which is a calculator par excellence.
I have to say that all that description of 52! seconds brought to mind the descriptions that the Hindus have for the very large epochs of time that feature in their religion. I’m not that well-versed in their religion, so perhaps someone else out there can tell me which is larger: 52! seconds, or the period of the “big cycle” in Hindu mythology in which everything repeats.
Your comment reminded me of the Arthur C. Clarke short story, “The Nine Billion Names of God,” which is about Buddhist monks in Tibet rather than Hindus, but the plot does hinge on the consequences of hiring two engineers and a computer to travel to Tibet and print out all the billions of names for God:
https://faculty.winthrop.edu/kosterj/WRIT510/readings/The%20Nine%20Billion%20Names%20of%20God.pdf
Clarke wrote the story in 1952, so he didn’t mention the possibility of 52! names of God, but it’s still a good SF story.
Yep you’re all unique but no matter how unique and special you are, I’m always delighted that I’m me instead of thee,
unless, of course, you’re in a sailboat with 4 or more knots blowing off the shore & I’m landbound.