I once read a tragic story about a Chukchi who was taught by polar explorers to count and write down numbers. The magic of numbers amazed him so much that he decided to write down absolutely all the numbers in the world in a row, starting with one, in a notebook donated by polar explorers. The Chukchi abandons all his affairs, stops communicating even with his own wife, no longer hunts ringed seals and seals, but keeps writing and writing numbers in a notebook…. This is how a year goes by. In the end, the notebook runs out and the Chukchi realizes that he could only write down a small part all numbers. He weeps bitterly and in despair burns his scribbled notebook in order to again begin to live the simple life of a fisherman, no longer thinking about the mysterious infinity of numbers...
Let's not repeat the feat of this Chukchi and try to find the most big number, since any number only needs to add one to get an even larger number. Let us ask ourselves a similar but different question: which of the numbers that have their own name is the largest?
It is obvious that although the numbers themselves are infinite, they do not have so many proper names, since most of them are content with names made up of smaller numbers. So, for example, the numbers 1 and 100 have their own names “one” and “one hundred,” and the name of the number 101 is already compound (“one hundred and one”). It is clear that in the finite set of numbers that humanity has awarded own name, there must be some largest number. But what is it called and what does it equal? Let's try to figure this out and find, in the end, this is the largest number!
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"Short" and "long" scale
Story modern system The names of large numbers date back to the middle of the 15th century, when in Italy they began to use the words “million” (literally - large thousand) for a thousand squared, “bimillion” for a million squared and “trimillion” for a million cubed. We know about this system thanks to French mathematician Nicolas Chuquet (Nicolas Chuquet, ca. 1450 - ca. 1500): in his treatise “The Science of Numbers” (Triparty en la science des nombres, 1484) he developed this idea, proposing to further use Latin cardinal numerals (see table), adding them to the ending “-million”. So, “bimillion” for Schuke turned into a billion, “trimillion” became a trillion, and a million to the fourth power became “quadrillion”.
In the Schuquet system, the number 10 9, located between a million and a billion, did not have its own name and was simply called “a thousand millions”, similarly 10 15 was called “a thousand billions”, 10 21 - “a thousand trillion”, etc. This was not very convenient, and in 1549 the French writer and scientist Jacques Peletier du Mans (1517-1582) proposed naming such “intermediate” numbers using the same Latin prefixes, but with the ending “-billion”. Thus, 10 9 began to be called “billion”, 10 15 - “billiard”, 10 21 - “trillion”, etc.
The Chuquet-Peletier system gradually became popular and was used throughout Europe. However, in the 17th century an unexpected problem arose. It turned out that for some reason some scientists began to get confused and call the number 10 9 not “billion” or “thousand millions”, but “billion”. Soon this error quickly spread, and a paradoxical situation arose - “billion” became simultaneously synonymous with “billion” (10 9) and “million millions” (10 18).
This confusion continued for quite a long time and led to the fact that the United States created its own system for naming large numbers. According to the American system, the names of numbers are constructed in the same way as in the Chuquet system - the Latin prefix and the ending “million”. However, the magnitudes of these numbers are different. If in the Schuquet system names with the ending “illion” received numbers that were powers of a million, then in the American system the ending “-illion” received powers of a thousand. That is, a thousand million (1000 3 = 10 9) began to be called a “billion”, 1000 4 (10 12) - a “trillion”, 1000 5 (10 15) - a “quadrillion”, etc.
The old system of naming large numbers continued to be used in conservative Great Britain and began to be called “British” throughout the world, despite the fact that it was invented by the French Chuquet and Peletier. However, in the 1970s the UK officially switched to " American system”, which led to the fact that calling one system American and the other British became somehow strange. As a result, the American system is now commonly referred to as the "short scale" British system or the Chuquet-Peletier system - “long scale”.
To avoid confusion, let's summarize:
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The short naming scale is now used in the US, UK, Canada, Ireland, Australia, Brazil and Puerto Rico. Russia, Denmark, Turkey and Bulgaria also use a short scale, except that the number 10 9 is called "billion" rather than "billion". The long scale continues to be used in most other countries.
It is curious that in our country the final transition to a short scale occurred only in the second half of the 20th century. So, for example, Yakov Isidorovich Perelman (1882-1942) in his “Entertaining Arithmetic” mentions parallel existence in the USSR there are two scales. The short scale, according to Perelman, was used in everyday life and financial calculations, and the long one is in scientific books on astronomy and physics. However, now it is wrong to use a long scale in Russia, although the numbers there are large.
But let's return to the search for the largest number. After decillion, the names of numbers are obtained by combining prefixes. This produces numbers such as undecillion, duodecillion, tredecillion, quattordecillion, quindecillion, sexdecillion, septemdecillion, octodecillion, novemdecillion, etc. However, these names are no longer interesting to us, since we agreed to find the largest number with its own non-composite name.
If we turn to Latin grammar, we will find that the Romans had only three non-compound names for numbers greater than ten: viginti - “twenty”, centum - “hundred” and mille - “thousand”. The Romans did not have their own names for numbers greater than a thousand. For example, the Romans called a million (1,000,000) “decies centena milia,” that is, “ten times a hundred thousand.” According to Chuquet's rule, these three remaining Latin numerals give us such names for numbers as "vigintillion", "centillion" and "millillion".
So, we found out that on the “short scale” the maximum number that has its own name and is not a composite of smaller numbers is “million” (10 3003). If Russia adopted a “long scale” for naming numbers, then the largest number with its own name would be “billion” (10 6003).
However, there are names for even larger numbers.
Numbers outside the system
Some numbers have their own name, without any connection with the naming system using Latin prefixes. And there are many such numbers. You can, for example, remember the number e, number “pi”, dozen, number of the beast, etc. However, since we are now interested big numbers, then we will consider only those numbers with their own non-composite name that are more than a million.
Until the 17th century in Rus' it was used own system names of numbers. Tens of thousands were called "darkness", hundreds of thousands were called "legions", millions were called "leoders", tens of millions were called "ravens", and hundreds of millions were called "decks". This count of up to hundreds of millions was called the “small count,” and in some manuscripts the authors considered “ great score”, in which the same names were used for large numbers, but with a different meaning. So, “darkness” no longer meant ten thousand, but a thousand thousand (10 6), “legion” - the darkness of those (10 12); “leodr” - legion of legions (10 24), “raven” - leodr of leodrov (10 48). For some reason, “deck” in the great Slavic counting was not called “raven of ravens” (10 96), but only ten “ravens”, that is, 10 49 (see table).
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The number 10,100 also has its own name and was invented by a nine-year-old boy. And it was like this. In 1938, American mathematician Edward Kasner (1878-1955) was walking in the park with his two nephews and discussing large numbers with them. During the conversation, we talked about a number with a hundred zeros, which did not have its own name. One of the nephews, nine-year-old Milton Sirott, suggested calling this number “googol.” In 1940, Edward Kasner, together with James Newman, wrote the popular science book Mathematics and the Imagination, where he told mathematics lovers about the googol number. Googol became even more widely known in the late 1990s, thanks to the Google search engine named after it.
The name for an even larger number than googol arose in 1950 thanks to the father of computer science, Claude Elwood Shannon (1916-2001). In his article "Programming a Computer to Play Chess" he tried to estimate the number possible options chess game. According to it, each game lasts on average 40 moves and on each move the player makes a choice from an average of 30 options, which corresponds to 900 40 (approximately equal to 10,118) game options. This work became widely known, and this number became known as the “Shannon number.”
In the famous Buddhist treatise Jaina Sutra, dating back to 100 BC, the number “asankheya” is found equal to 10,140. It is believed that this number is equal to the number cosmic cycles necessary to achieve nirvana.
Nine-year-old Milton Sirotta went down in the history of mathematics not only because he invented the number googol, but also because at the same time he proposed another number - the “googolplex”, which is equal to 10 to the power of “googol”, that is, one with a googol of zeros.
Two more numbers larger than the googolplex were proposed by the South African mathematician Stanley Skewes (1899-1988) when proving the Riemann hypothesis. The first number, which later became known as the "Skuse number", is equal to e to a degree e to a degree e to the power of 79, that is e e e 79 = 10 10 8.85.10 33 . However, the “second Skewes number” is even larger and is 10 10 10 1000.
Obviously, the more powers there are in the powers, the more difficult it is to write the numbers and understand their meaning when reading. Moreover, it is possible to come up with such numbers (and, by the way, they have already been invented) when the degrees of degrees simply do not fit on the page. Yes, that's on the page! They won't even fit into a book the size of the entire Universe! In this case, the question arises of how to write such numbers. The problem, fortunately, is solvable, and mathematicians have developed several principles for writing such numbers. True, every mathematician who asked about this problem came up with his own way of writing, which led to the existence of several unrelated methods for writing large numbers - these are the notations of Knuth, Conway, Steinhaus, etc. We now have to deal with some of them.
Other notations
In 1938, the same year that nine-year-old Milton Sirotta invented the numbers googol and googolplex, a book about entertaining mathematics, A Mathematical Kaleidoscope, written by Hugo Dionizy Steinhaus (1887-1972), was published in Poland. This book became very popular, went through many editions and was translated into many languages, including English and Russian. In it, Steinhaus, discussing large numbers, offers a simple way to write them using three geometric figures- triangle, square and circle:
"n in a triangle" means " n n»,
« n squared" means " n V n triangles",
« n in a circle" means " n V n squares."
Explaining this method of notation, Steinhaus comes up with the number "mega" equal to 2 in a circle and shows that it is equal to 256 in a "square" or 256 in 256 triangles. To calculate it, you need to raise 256 to the power of 256, raise the resulting number 3.2.10 616 to the power of 3.2.10 616, then raise the resulting number to the power of the resulting number, and so on, raise it to the power 256 times. For example, a calculator in MS Windows cannot calculate due to overflow of 256 even in two triangles. Approximately this huge number is 10 10 2.10 619.
Having determined the “mega” number, Steinhaus invites readers to independently estimate another number - “medzon”, equal to 3 in a circle. In another edition of the book, Steinhaus, instead of medzone, suggests estimating an even larger number - “megiston”, equal to 10 in a circle. Following Steinhaus, I also recommend that readers break away from this text for a while and try to write these numbers themselves using ordinary powers in order to feel their gigantic magnitude.
However, there are names for b O larger numbers. Thus, the Canadian mathematician Leo Moser (Leo Moser, 1921-1970) modified the Steinhaus notation, which was limited by the fact that if it were necessary to write numbers much larger than megiston, then difficulties and inconveniences would arise, since it would be necessary to draw many circles one inside another. Moser suggested that after the squares, draw not circles, but pentagons, then hexagons, and so on. He also proposed a formal notation for these polygons so that numbers could be written without drawing complex pictures. Moser notation looks like this:
« n triangle" = n n = n;
« n squared" = n = « n V n triangles" = nn;
« n in a pentagon" = n = « n V n squares" = nn;
« n V k+ 1-gon" = n[k+1] = " n V n k-gons" = n[k]n.
Thus, according to Moser’s notation, Steinhaus’s “mega” is written as 2, “medzone” as 3, and “megiston” as 10. In addition, Leo Moser proposed calling a polygon with the number of sides equal to mega - “megagon”. And he proposed the number “2 in megagon”, that is, 2. This number became known as the Moser number or simply as “Moser”.
But even “Moser” is not the largest number. So, the largest number ever used in mathematical proof is the "Graham number". This number was first used by the American mathematician Ronald Graham in 1977 when proving one estimate in Ramsey theory, namely when calculating the dimension of certain n-dimensional bichromatic hypercubes. Graham's number became famous only after it was described in Martin Gardner's 1989 book, From Penrose Mosaics to Reliable Ciphers.
To explain how large Graham's number is, we have to explain another way of writing large numbers, introduced by Donald Knuth in 1976. American professor Donald Knuth came up with the concept of superpower, which he proposed to write with arrows pointing upward:
I think everything is clear, so let’s return to Graham’s number. Ronald Graham proposed the so-called G-numbers:
The number G 64 is called the Graham number (it is often designated simply as G). This number is the largest known number in the world used in a mathematical proof, and is even listed in the Guinness Book of Records.
And finally
Having written this article, I can’t help but resist the temptation to come up with my own number. Let this number be called " stasplex"and will be equal to the number G 100. Remember it, and when your children ask what the largest number in the world is, tell them that this number is called stasplex.
Partner news
Sometimes people who are not involved in mathematics wonder: what is the largest number? On the one hand, the answer is obvious - infinity. Bores will even clarify that “plus infinity” or “+∞” is used by mathematicians. But this answer will not convince the most corrosive, especially since it is not natural number, but a mathematical abstraction. But having understood the issue well, they can discover a very interesting problem.
Indeed, the size limit is in this case does not exist, but there is a limit human fantasy. Each number has a name: ten, one hundred, billion, sextillion, and so on. But where does people's imagination end?
Not to be confused with a trademark of Google Corporation, although they have a common origin. This number is written as 10100, that is, one followed by a hundred zeros. It is difficult to imagine, but it was actively used in mathematics.
It's funny that it was invented by a child - the nephew of the mathematician Edward Kasner. In 1938, my uncle entertained his younger relatives with discussions about very large numbers. To the child’s indignation, it turned out that such a wonderful number had no name, and he gave his own version. Later, my uncle inserted it into one of his books, and the term stuck.
Theoretically, a googol is a natural number, because it can be used for counting. But it’s unlikely that anyone will have the patience to count to the end. Therefore, only theoretically.
And as for the name Google, then a common mistake has crept in. The first investor and one of the co-founders was in a hurry when he wrote out the check and missed the letter “O”, but in order to cash it, the company had to be registered with this particular spelling.
Googolplex
This number is a derivative of googol, but is significantly larger than it. The prefix “plex” means raising ten to a power equal to the base number, so guloplex is 10 to the power of 10 to the power of 100 or 101000.
The resulting number exceeds the number of particles in the observable Universe, which is estimated to be about 1080 degrees. But this did not stop scientists from increasing the number by simply adding the prefix “plex” to it: googolplexplex, googolplexplexplex and so on. And for particularly perverted mathematicians, they invented a variant of magnification without the endless repetition of the prefix “plex” - they simply put Greek numbers in front of it: tetra (four), penta (five) and so on, up to deca (ten). The last option sounds like a googoldecaplex and means a tenfold cumulative repetition of the procedure of raising the number 10 to the power of its base. The main thing is not to imagine the result. You still won’t be able to realize it, but it’s easy to get mentally injured.
48th Mersen number
Main characters: Cooper, his computer and a new prime number
Relatively recently, about a year ago, we managed to discover the next, 48th Mersen number. On this moment it is the largest prime number in the world. Let us recall that prime numbers are those that are divisible without a remainder only by one and themselves. The simplest examples are 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17 and so on. The problem is that the further into the wilds, the less common such numbers are. But the more valuable is the discovery of each next one. For example, the new prime number consists of 17,425,170 digits if represented in the form of the decimal number system familiar to us. The previous one had about 12 million characters.
It was discovered by the American mathematician Curtis Cooper, who delighted the mathematical community with a similar record for the third time. It took him 39 days of work just to check his result and prove that this number was really prime. personal computer.
This is what the Graham number looks like in Knuth arrow notation. It’s difficult to say how to decipher this without having a complete higher education in theoretical mathematics. Write it down in the usual way decimal is also impossible: the observable Universe is simply not able to accommodate it. Building one degree at a time, as is the case with googolplexes, is also not a solution.
Good formula, just unclear
So why do we need this seemingly useless number? Firstly, for the curious, it was placed in the Guinness Book of Records, and this is already a lot. Secondly, it was used to solve a problem included in the Ramsey problem, which is also unclear, but sounds serious. Thirdly, this number is recognized as the largest ever used in mathematics, and not in comic proofs or intellectual games, but to solve a very specific mathematical problem.
Attention! The following information is dangerous for your mental health! By reading it, you accept responsibility for all consequences!
For those who want to test their mind and meditate on the Graham number, we can try to explain it (but only try).
Imagine 33. It's pretty easy - it turns out 3*3*3=27. What if we now raise three to this number? The result is 3 3 to the 3rd power, or 3 27. In decimal notation, this is equal to 7,625,597,484,987. A lot, but for now it can be realized.
In Knuth's arrow notation, this number can be displayed somewhat more simply - 33. But if you add only one arrow, it becomes more complicated: 33, which means 33 to the power of 33 or in power notation. If we expand to decimal notation, we get 7,625,597,484,987 7,625,597,484,987. Are you still able to follow your thoughts?
Next stage: 33= 33 33 . That is, you need to calculate this wild number from the previous action and raise it to the same power.
And 33 is only the first of 64 terms of Graham's number. To get the second one, you need to calculate the result of this mind-blowing formula and substitute the corresponding number of arrows into diagram 3(...)3. And so on, another 63 times.
I wonder if anyone other than him and a dozen other supermathematicians will be able to get to at least the middle of the sequence without going crazy?
Did you understand something? We are not. But what a thrill!
Why do we need the largest numbers? This is difficult for the average person to understand and comprehend. But with their help, a few specialists are able to introduce new technological toys to ordinary people: phones, computers, tablets. Ordinary people are also unable to understand how they work, but they are happy to use them for their entertainment. And everyone is happy: ordinary people get their toys, “supernerds” have the opportunity to continue playing their mind games.
Once upon a time in childhood, we learned to count to ten, then to a hundred, then to a thousand. So what's the biggest number you know? A thousand, a million, a billion, a trillion... And then? Petallion, someone will say, and he will be wrong, because he confuses the SI prefix with a completely different concept.
In fact, the question is not as simple as it seems at first glance. Firstly, we are talking about naming the names of powers of a thousand. And here, the first nuance that many know from American films is that they call our billion a billion.
Further, there are two types of scales - long and short. In our country, a short scale is used. In this scale, at each step the mantissa increases by three orders of magnitude, i.e. multiply by a thousand - thousand 10 3, million 10 6, billion/billion 10 9, trillion (10 12). In the long scale, after a billion 10 9 there is a billion 10 12, and subsequently the mantissa increases by six orders of magnitude, and next number, which is called a trillion, already means 10 18.
But let's return to our native scale. Want to know what comes after a trillion? Please:
10 3 thousand
10 6 million
10 9 billion
10 12 trillion
10 15 quadrillion
10 18 quintillion
10 21 sextillion
10 24 septillion
10 27 octillion
10 30 nonillion
10 33 decillion
10 36 undecillion
10 39 dodecillion
10 42 tredecillion
10 45 quattoordecillion
10 48 quindecillion
10 51 cedecillion
10 54 septdecillion
10 57 duodevigintillion
10 60 undevigintillion
10 63 vigintillion
10 66 anvigintillion
10 69 duovigintillion
10 72 trevigintillion
10 75 quattorvigintillion
10 78 quinvigintillion
10 81 sexvigintillion
10 84 septemvigintillion
10 87 octovigintillion
10 90 novemvigintillion
10 93 trigintillion
10 96 antigintillion
At this number our short scale cannot stand it, and subsequently the mantis increases progressively.
10 100 googol
10,123 quadragintillion
10,153 quinquagintillion
10,183 sexagintillion
10,213 septuagintillion
10,243 octogintillion
10,273 nonagintillion
10,303 centillion
10,306 centunillion
10,309 centullion
10,312 centtrillion
10,315 centquadrillion
10,402 centretrigintillion
10,603 decentillion
10,903 trcentillion
10 1203 quadringentillion
10 1503 quingentillion
10 1803 sescentillion
10 2103 septingentillion
10 2403 oxtingentillion
10 2703 nongentillion
10 3003 million
10 6003 duo-million
10 9003 three million
10 3000003 mimiliaillion
10 6000003 duomimiliaillion
10 10 100 googolplex
10 3×n+3 zillion
Google(from English googol) - number, in decimal system notation represented by one followed by 100 zeros:
10 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000
In 1938, American mathematician Edward Kasner (1878-1955) was walking in the park with his two nephews and discussing large numbers with them. During the conversation, we talked about a number with a hundred zeros, which did not have its own name. One of the nephews, nine-year-old Milton Sirotta, suggested calling this number “googol.” In 1940, Edward Kasner, together with James Newman, wrote the popular science book “Mathematics and Imagination” (“New Names in Mathematics”), where he told mathematics lovers about the googol number.
The term "googol" does not have a serious theoretical and practical significance. Kasner proposed it to illustrate the difference between an unimaginably large number and infinity, and the term is sometimes used in mathematics teaching for this purpose.
Googolplex(from the English googolplex) - a number represented by a unit with a googol of zeros. Like the googol, the term "googolplex" was coined by American mathematician Edward Kasner and his nephew Milton Sirotta.
The number of googols is greater than the number of all particles in the part of the universe known to us, which ranges from 1079 to 1081. Thus, the number googolplex, consisting of (googol + 1) digits, cannot be written down in the classical “decimal” form, even if all matter in the known parts of the universe turned into paper and ink or computer disk space.
Zillion(English zillion) - a general name for very large numbers.
This term does not have a strict mathematical definition. In 1996, Conway (eng. J. H. Conway) and Guy (eng. R. K. Guy) in their book English. The Book of Numbers defined a zillion to the nth power as 10 3×n+3 for the short scale number naming system.
Have you ever thought how many zeros there are in one million? This is a pretty simple question. What about a billion or a trillion? One followed by nine zeros (1000000000) - what is the name of the number?
A short list of numbers and their quantitative designation
- Ten (1 zero).
- One hundred (2 zeros).
- One thousand (3 zeros).
- Ten thousand (4 zeros).
- One hundred thousand (5 zeros).
- Million (6 zeros).
- Billion (9 zeros).
- Trillion (12 zeros).
- Quadrillion (15 zeros).
- Quintilion (18 zeros).
- Sextillion (21 zeros).
- Septillion (24 zeros).
- Octalion (27 zeros).
- Nonalion (30 zeros).
- Decalion (33 zeros).
Grouping of zeros
1000000000 - what is the name of a number that has 9 zeros? This is a billion. For convenience, large numbers are usually grouped into sets of three, separated from each other by a space or punctuation marks such as a comma or period.
This is done to make the quantitative value easier to read and understand. For example, what is the name of the number 1000000000? In this form, it’s worth straining a little and doing the math. And if you write 1,000,000,000, then the task immediately becomes visually easier, since you need to count not zeros, but triples of zeros.
Numbers with a lot of zeros
The most popular are million and billion (1000000000). What is the name of a number that has 100 zeros? This is a Googol number, so called by Milton Sirotta. It's wild great amount. Do you think this number is large? Then what about a googolplex, a one followed by a googol of zeros? This figure is so large that it is difficult to come up with a meaning for it. In fact, there is no need for such giants, except to count the number of atoms in the infinite Universe.
Is 1 billion a lot?
There are two measurement scales - short and long. Around the world in science and finance, 1 billion is 1,000 million. This is on a short scale. According to it, this is a number with 9 zeros.
There is also a long scale which is used in some European countries, including in France, and was previously used in the UK (until 1971), where a billion was 1 million millions, that is, one followed by 12 zeros. This gradation is also called the long-term scale. The short scale is now predominant in financial and scientific matters.
Some European languages, such as Swedish, Danish, Portuguese, Spanish, Italian, Dutch, Norwegian, Polish, German, use billion (or billion) in this system. In Russian, a number with 9 zeros is also described for the short scale of a thousand million, and a trillion is a million million. This avoids unnecessary confusion.
Conversational options
In Russian colloquial speech after the events of 1917 - the Great October revolution- and the period of hyperinflation in the early 1920s. 1 billion rubles was called “limard”. And in the dashing 1990s, a new slang expression “watermelon” appeared for a billion; a million were called “lemon.”
The word "billion" is now used internationally. This is a natural number, which is represented in the decimal system as 10 9 (one followed by 9 zeros). There is also another name - billion, which is not used in Russia and the CIS countries.
Billion = billion?
A word such as billion is used to designate a billion only in those states in which the “short scale” is adopted as a basis. These are countries like Russian Federation, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, USA, Canada, Greece and Turkey. In other countries, the concept of a billion means the number 10 12, that is, one followed by 12 zeros. In countries with a “short scale”, including Russia, this figure corresponds to 1 trillion.
Such confusion appeared in France at a time when the formation of such a science as algebra was taking place. Initially, a billion had 12 zeros. However, everything changed after the appearance of the main manual on arithmetic (author Tranchan) in 1558), where a billion is already a number with 9 zeros (a thousand millions).
For several subsequent centuries, these two concepts were used on an equal basis with each other. In the mid-20th century, namely in 1948, France switched to a long scale numerical naming system. In this regard, the short scale, once borrowed from the French, is still different from the one they use today.
Historically, the United Kingdom has used the long-term billion, but since 1974 official statistics The UK used a short-term scale. Since the 1950s, the short-term scale has been increasingly used in the fields of technical writing and journalism, although the long-term scale still persists.
10 to the 3003rd power
Disputes about which one is the most big number in the world are ongoing. Different calculus systems offer different variants and people don’t know what to believe, and which figure to consider as the largest.
This question has interested scientists since the times of the Roman Empire. The biggest problem lies in the definition of what a “number” is and what a “digit” is. At one time people long time The largest number was considered to be a decillion, that is, 10 to the 33rd power. But, after scientists began to actively study the American and English metric systems, it was discovered that the largest number in the world is 10 to the 3003rd power - a million. Men in Everyday life They believe that the largest figure is a trillion. Moreover, this is quite formal, since after a trillion, names are simply not given, because the counting begins to be too complex. However, purely theoretically, the number of zeros can be added indefinitely. Therefore, it is almost impossible to imagine even purely visually a trillion and what follows it.
In Roman numerals
On the other hand, the definition of “number” as understood by mathematicians is a little different. A number means a sign that is universally accepted and is used to indicate a quantity expressed in a numerical equivalent. The second concept of “number” means the expression of quantitative characteristics in a convenient form through the use of numbers. It follows from this that numbers are made up of digits. It is also important that the number has symbolic properties. They are conditioned, recognizable, unchangeable. Numbers also have sign properties, but they follow from the fact that numbers consist of digits. From this we can conclude that a trillion is not a number at all, but a number. Then what is the largest number in the world if it is not a trillion, which is a number?
The important thing is that numbers are used as components of numbers, but not only that. A number, however, is the same number if we are talking about some things, counting them from zero to nine. This system of features applies not only to the familiar Arabic numerals, but also to Roman I, V, X, L, C, D, M. These are Roman numerals. On the other hand, V I I I is roman numeral. In Arabic calculus it corresponds to the number eight.
Thus, it turns out that counting units from zero to nine are considered numbers, and everything else is numbers. Hence the conclusion that the largest number in the world is nine. 9 is a sign, and a number is a simple quantitative abstraction. A trillion is a number, and not a number at all, and therefore cannot be the largest number in the world. A trillion can be called the largest number in the world, and that is purely nominally, since numbers can be counted ad infinitum. The number of digits is strictly limited - from 0 to 9.
It should also be remembered that numbers and numbers different systems the calculations do not coincide, as we saw from the examples with Arabic and Roman numbers and numerals. This happens because numbers and numbers are simple concepts, which are invented by the person himself. Therefore, a number in one number system can easily be a number in another and vice versa.
Thus, the largest number is innumerable, because it can continue to be added indefinitely from digits. As for the numbers themselves, in the generally accepted system, 9 is considered the largest number.
