The world is getting smaller, and numbers are getting smaller. I used to think 32 bits was a lot; it would take a long time to count to four billion on an Apple ][ running Basic, even snappy Integer Basic. Although, come to remember, that would take a bit of trickiness: Apple Integer Basic variables were only 16 bits.
Now you can count to four billion in a second or two. I mean, your designated counting apparatus can.
I used to think 64 bits was a lot, but it turns out that a fortnight of femtoseconds exceeds it.
The old Arthur C Clarke story made 9,000,000,000 sound like such a large number. They needed several months of IBM computer-time to count that high. That’s only 33 bits and a hair.
How long until there are nine billion blogs? “Blah, blah, blah.”
Anyway, this is one of ‘em. That’s my introduction.
I’ve very pleased to learn of your blog, David. And especially glad to observe that it and myself share the same birthday!