If one grain of rise weights 2 mg, then 2^64 - 1 grains of rice weigh 
about 36,000,000,000 metric tonnes (i.e., thirty six thousand million).

That's a crapload of rice! (Wolfram Alpha claims it's roughly 50% of the 
total biomass on planet Earth.)

I guess the moral of the story is do NOT screw with exponential 
functions. (!!)

Post a reply to this message

Invisible <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
> If one grain of rise weights 2 mg, then 2^64 - 1 grains of rice weigh 
> about 36,000,000,000 metric tonnes (i.e., thirty six thousand million).

  A reference to that classical (although most probably apocryphal)
chess story.

  It demonstrates, however, how little the human mind comprehends
exponential growth (even though it's something that can sometimes
be observed in everyday life, eg. in the spread of bacteria or mold).

  There's a funny experiment you can do to a friend related to that.
You tell him: "Suppose you have a really large piece of cardboard
which is 1 mm thick. Now you fold it once, and the result is 2 mm
thick. Fold it again, and the result is 4 mm thick, and so on. How
many times would you have to fold it so that it would be so thick
as to reach the Moon?"

  Of course the answer is surprisingly small.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

Post a reply to this message

>> If one grain of rise weights 2 mg, then 2^64 - 1 grains of rice weigh 
>> about 36,000,000,000 metric tonnes (i.e., thirty six thousand million).
> 
>   A reference to that classical (although most probably apocryphal)
> chess story.

Indeed.

>   There's a funny experiment you can do to a friend related to that.
> You tell him: "Suppose you have a really large piece of cardboard
> which is 1 mm thick. Now you fold it once, and the result is 2 mm
> thick. Fold it again, and the result is 4 mm thick, and so on. How
> many times would you have to fold it so that it would be so thick
> as to reach the Moon?"
> 
>   Of course the answer is surprisingly small.

Actually, I saw Brainiac investigate exactly how many times you can fold 
a piece of paper before it becomes so thick that you can't fold it.

They "cheated" by using a reel of industrial tissue paper, which is 
much, much thinner than normal paper. The first few folds presented 
little difficulty. By the time they got to (IIRC) the 12th fold, they 
drove a minivan over it to hold it, and it still wouldn't stay bent...

Post a reply to this message

Invisible <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
> Actually, I saw Brainiac investigate exactly how many times you can fold 
> a piece of paper before it becomes so thick that you can't fold it.

  Never believe anything you see on Brainiac. They are just a bunch of liars
who do things for the entertainment, not for the science, and if that means
lying to the viewers, so be it.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

Post a reply to this message

Warp wrote:
> Invisible <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
>> Actually, I saw Brainiac investigate exactly how many times you can fold 
>> a piece of paper before it becomes so thick that you can't fold it.
> 
>   Never believe anything you see on Brainiac. They are just a bunch of liars
> who do things for the entertainment, not for the science, and if that means
> lying to the viewers, so be it.

Well, yeah, most of the stuff they do has about as much scientific basis 
as astrology. (Actually, I think I just insulted astrology!) 
Occasionally they do something vaguely interesting though...

Post a reply to this message

Invisible wrote:
> They "cheated" by using a reel of industrial tissue paper, which is 

I've seen the same thing with newsprint, and it was 8 or 10 folds, even 
starting out with a sheet several meters on a side.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
    C# - a language whose greatest drawback
    is that its best implementation comes
    from a company that doesn't hate Microsoft.

Post a reply to this message