Big Numbers

Googols and Quintillions: Hypography looks for the really huge quantities in our hunt for Big Numbers.

Posted by Tormod Guldvog
13 September, 2001 04:09:35

There are some strange phenomena in the world of Big Numbers. For example, there is a concept called "transfinite numbers", which are numbers which are larger than infinity. Quite a mind-boggling concept.

Of course, this kind of thinking makes it obvious that our minds are capable of creating numbers which are fantasies, that is, they do not describe anything that actually exists.

One of the biggest numbers is actually very small (but incredibly long): Pi. It is one of the great wonders of mathematics that the relationship between the circumference and the diameter of the circle, is a never-ending list of random numbers.

This Hypography is a brief introduction to the science of big numbers. And don't forget to take the poll!

Related Links

The Pi Trivia Game
http://eveander.com/trivia/
Take this test to see if you really know your Pi.

Recreational Topics from the World of Numbers
http://ping4.ping.be/~ping6758/index.shtml
This is a fun page if your into numerology. Lots of big numbers here. Maintained by Patrick De Geest.

Transfinite Numbers
http://www.anselm.edu/homepage/dbanach/infin.htm
Transfinite numbers are numbers which are so big that they surpass infinity. Now, how is that possible? You better read this.

Eric Weisstein's Large Numbers
http://mathworld.wolfram.com/LargeNumber.html
This is a list of labels for large numbers in both British and American English.

Extremely Large Numbers
http://www.sci.wsu.edu/math/faculty/hudelson/moser.html
A page wbout some really big numbers, written by Matt Hudelson.

Large Numbers
http://www.mrob.com/largenum.html
This is a great page written by Robert P. Munafo, featuring some very large numbers and how they are produced.

Inverse Symbolic Calculator
http://www.cecm.sfu.ca/projects/ISC/
Enter big numbers into the calculator and see what happens to them. Or browse through their list of really big numbers.

Ramanujan, Modular Equations, and Approximations to Pi or How to compute One Billion Digits of Pi
http://www.cecm.sfu.ca/organics/papers/borwein/index.html
This is a rather heavy document for the technically oriented. But it shows how much effort scientists put into calculcating endless digits of Pi.

Pi through the ages
http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/HistTopics/Pi_through_the_ages.html
An entertaining and quite readable text on the history of Pi.

Large Numbers and Infinity
http://forum.swarthmore.edu/dr.math/faq/faq.large.numbers.html
Ask Dr. Math has a brief introduction to big numbers.