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Millions and Billions
Name: Bill Presler
Status: N/A
Age: N/A
Location: N/A
Country: N/A
Date: N/A
Question:
I would like to find examples of the numbers "million" and
"billion".
I feel that these numbers referred to too often in everyday speech, and
that most people don't have a good concept of the magnitude these numbers
represent. Can you provide any examples?
Replies:
Here's one:
If you had a million dollars today and set about spending $1,000 of it each
day, it would run out in a little less than three years. If you had a
billion dollars at the time of the reign of Roman Emperor Augustus, and set
about spending $1,000 of it each day, you would only be about 3/4 through
it now.
Richard Barrans Jr., Ph.D.
Chemical Separations Group
Chemistry Division CHM/200
Argonne National Laboratory
9700 South Cass Avenue
Argonne, IL 60439
richb@anl.gov
A typical walking stride is about 3 feet. Hence if you take a
million steps you will have walked about 63 miles.
Your heart beats about 60 times a minute. To beat a billion times
takes it about 32 years, so a lifetime is, typically, 2 to 3 billion
heartbeats long.
Grayce
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Update: June 2012
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