Unimaginably huge number, No jokes

[Gib Z]

Grahams Number: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graham's_number

Anybody have any tips on how to comprehend something this huge? The number of elementary particles in a trillion universes doesn't even come close...

 

[Astronuc]

It's not something I wake up and worry about.

As for a trillion universes, we only need to be concerned about this one, and in this one, we seem to have trouble taking care of the one planet, which we inhabit.

Life is too short to worry about big numbers.

 

[robphy]

The wikipedia article links to a website which has this page
http://www-users.cs.york.ac.uk/susan/cyc/b/big.htm
which has the statement
3 --> 3 --> 64 --> 2 < Graham's number < 3 --> 3 --> 65 --> 2 < 3 --> 3 --> 3 --> 3
(see the article for an explanation of the notation due to John Conway)

 

[rewebster]

that number reminds me of that photograph thread with all the plastic bottles, Denali's, etc.

I like 'infinity plus or minus one' better

 

[neutrino]

I find it hard even to attempt to comprehend simpler numbers such as the estimated number of stars in our galaxy, or the number of galaxies in the observed universe. So this WAAAY too much.

 

[G01]

Anybody have any tips on how to comprehend something this huge? The number of elementary particles in a trillion universes doesn't even come close...

It's a number. I hate to break it to you, but there are an infinite amount of numbers bigger than that!

 

[Hurkyl]

http://mathworld.wolfram.com/FrivolousTheoremofArithmetic.html

 

[devil-fire]

It's a number. I hate to break it to you, but there are an infinite amount of numbers bigger than that!

omg. you just blew my mind.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

...and an infinite set of infinite sets of numbers.

But do they really exist?