new unit: the Sagan
26 Jan 2010 14:52:30 UTC
Topic 194748
(moderation:
I would like to respectfully suggest that Sagan be given a unit. It can be for distance or shear number of objects - like the numbers of stars in the sky is 1 Sagan. On is show "Cosmos" he often used the expression "billions upon billions." Perhaps 10^18 = 1 Sagan.
Granted this is vague, but nobody will listen so there ya' go.
-LD
________________________________________
my faith
new unit: the Sagan
)
Carl Sagan would really deserve this honor, but unfortunately, this is already taken: 10 ^18 is "Exa". I'm not sure what 10^27 is, tho...all smaller powers of 10^3 definitely have names already.
CU
Bikeman
RE: Carl Sagan would
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I can't wait to get a 1 Saganbyte drive. :)
What about the abbreviation? Would that be a 1Sb drive? Unfortunately it looks a bit like 15b.
RE: I can't wait to get a 1
)
Go for 1 SagaByte and 1 SaB ???? :-)
He may have often used the expression "billions upon billions", but who is to say of what item? Maybe he was referring to of billions ....
So 10^27 sounds good, as "billions upon billions of billions" - can't see him disapproving ....
Cheers, Mike.
I have made this letter longer than usual because I lack the time to make it shorter ...
... and my other CPU is a Ryzen 5950X :-) Blaise Pascal
Still I think that astronomy
)
Still I think that astronomy has lost it's supremacy when it comes to big number to the banking sector...or soon will.
So maybe 10^27 will someday be called a Lehman or a Bernenke, who knows.
CU
HB
RE: Still I think that
)
Oh dear, we can't have that!
Perhaps we could auto-assign the bank numerals as having an implicit negative sign. We'll keep all the positive ones for astronomy.
That way :
1 Bear-Stearn < 1 Sagan
will always be true, regardless ...... :-)
Cheers, Mike.
I have made this letter longer than usual because I lack the time to make it shorter ...
... and my other CPU is a Ryzen 5950X :-) Blaise Pascal
LOL. Excellent idea!! HB
)
LOL. Excellent idea!!
HB
Good idea LivingDog! What
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Good idea LivingDog!
What about this definition?
The number of stars in our Milky Way Galaxy--->1 Sa
The name of the unit would be "Sagan"
The abbreviation would be Sa
RE: Good idea
)
(Sorry for the lateness of my reply, but)
(I am not getting email updates from the)
(board. Nonetheless, here I go.)
That looks great Dirk, but I would like to leave it as just 'S' b/c a Newton is just 'N'.
So maybe we can make it as you suggested with this amendment:
The number of stars in our Milky Way Galaxy = 1 S
The name of the unit would be "Sagan"
The abbreviation would be S.
We can compare our "familiar" galaxy to the number of stars in other galaxies. As we do with the solar mass, and the astronomical unit, the au.
e.g. the Andromeda galaxy has ~3.3 S., which would be read: "The Andromeda galaxy has approximately three point three Sagan."
Awesome. Let's you and me start a petition. ... how do we do that? :/
8]
-LD
________________________________________
my faith
RE: RE: Still I think
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I dont know if we ought assign numerical descriptions to these people at all, can't we just keep the famous collective noun "a wunch of bankers"? ;-)
RE: I dont know if we ought
)
:-)
Well we have cardinal, ordinal, natural, integer, rational, irrational, real, imaginary, quaternion and complex numbers. Try stupid numbers? :-)
[ Stupid numbers don't commute. Which means when you give them money, you don't get it back. They are associative, which means they give the money to their associates. The distributive law also applies, bestowing their families. Finally there is the foreclosure property, where negative amounts are brought back to zero. ]
Cheers, Mike.
( edit ) As for the Sagan, I really like the idea of the number stars in our galaxy. It flows nicely from a solar mass or the astronomical unit. It's a 'natural' measure and simple to demonstrate - "look over there at that, it's one of those". Even better, it would be a pure number without units or dimensions.
Compare with a parsec, say, which is kludgy as it ultimately depends on the division of the circle into 360 degrees of arc etc.
I have made this letter longer than usual because I lack the time to make it shorter ...
... and my other CPU is a Ryzen 5950X :-) Blaise Pascal