Large Numbers - Using Scientific Notation To Handle Large and Small Numbers

Using Scientific Notation To Handle Large and Small Numbers

See also: scientific notation, logarithmic scale, and orders of magnitude

Scientific notation was created to handle the wide range of values which occur in scientific study. 1.0 × 109, for example, means one billion, a 1 followed by nine zeros: 1 000 000 000, and 1.0 × 10−9 means one billionth, or 0.000 000 001. Writing 109 instead of nine zeros saves readers the effort and hazard of counting a long series of zeros to see how large the number is.

Read more about this topic:  Large Numbers

Famous quotes containing the words scientific, handle, large, small and/or numbers:

    “God isn’t compatible with machinery and scientific medicine and universal happiness. You must make your choice. Our civilization has chosen machinery and medicine and happiness.”
    —Aldous Huxley (1894–1963)

    “By God, the old man could handle a spade.
    Just like his old man.”
    —Seamus Heaney (b. 1939)

    “Women have no sympathy ... and my experience of women is almost as large as Europe.”
    —Florence Nightingale (1820–1910)

    “The gods attend to great matters, they neglect small ones.”
    —Marcus Tullius Cicero (106–43 B.C.)

    “Publishers are notoriously slothful about numbers, unless they’re attached to dollar signs—unlike journalists, quarterbacks, and felony criminal defendents who tend to be keenly aware of numbers at all times.”
    —Hunter S. Thompson (b. 1939)