Powers of Ten

Post by **BlueGene** » Tue Dec 20, 2005 2:41 am

Has anyone seen this? Pretty insane.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... ers+of+ten

Post by **tnf** » Tue Dec 20, 2005 3:21 am

i've had pages of that hanging in my classroom for 4 years.

Post by **werldhed** » Tue Dec 20, 2005 3:27 am

tnf, have you ever seen the 1971 video "Protein Synthesis: An epic on the cellular level"?

I just saw it a couple weeks ago...absolutely crazy. It blew my mind like only a drug induced orgy of biochemists can.

Post by **Bdw3** » Tue Dec 20, 2005 3:28 am

About the only thing I do remember from my 8th grade science class. :icon14:

Post by **tnf** » Tue Dec 20, 2005 3:32 am

werldhed wrote:tnf, have you ever seen the 1971 video "Protein Synthesis: An epic on the cellular level"?

I just saw it a couple weeks ago...absolutely crazy. It blew my mind like only a drug induced orgy of biochemists can.

haven't seen that one. might have to look it up.

I'm in the process of ordering Richard Dawkin's DVD version of the Ancestor's Tale. Great stuff.

Post by **werldhed** » Tue Dec 20, 2005 3:53 am

It's great. It's about 15 minutes long and introduced by Paul Berg (iirc). If you can find it you should check it out.

Post by **[xeno]Julios** » Tue Dec 20, 2005 4:24 am

nice video - i'm almost certain i saw it about 15 years ago at some disney land type place or something.

reminds me of the question about folding a thin sheet of paper in half, 100 times.

the resultant thickness will be about the radius of the universe (14 billion lightyears)

Post by **Canis** » Tue Dec 20, 2005 5:17 am

...and I was hoping for exponents. :icon8:

Post by **Dave** » Tue Dec 20, 2005 6:12 am

lawl. we watched this in my astronomy class. never knew the name of it though

Post by **bitWISE** » Tue Dec 20, 2005 6:51 am

Cool clip. Sucks the quality is so low on google because I hadn't seen it before.

Post by **mjrpes** » Tue Dec 20, 2005 8:18 am

[xeno]Julios wrote:nice video - i'm almost certain i saw it about 15 years ago at some disney land type place or something.

reminds me of the question about folding a thin sheet of paper in half, 100 times.

the resultant thickness will be about the radius of the universe (14 billion lightyears)

Chuck Norris did that once. He could have folded it again but it would have defied comprehension.

Post by **[xeno]Julios** » Tue Dec 20, 2005 11:17 am

Post by **glossy** » Tue Dec 20, 2005 1:09 pm

Canis wrote:...and I was hoping for exponents. :icon8:

it's not? damn.

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 2:15 am

[xeno]Julios wrote:nice video - i'm almost certain i saw it about 15 years ago at some disney land type place or something.

reminds me of the question about folding a thin sheet of paper in half, 100 times.

the resultant thickness will be about the radius of the universe (14 billion lightyears)

I don't get it, how long is the sheet exactly?

Post by **BlueGene** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 2:52 am

You know how you can only fold a regular piece of paper several times before it becomes unfoldable? Something a long these lines is what I think xeno is talking about.

Since your doubling the height every fold?

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 3:34 am

Even if I tripled the height with every fold, if the piece of paper was 0.1mm thick, 0.1*100³=100m. If it was 1mm thick (that is one fucking thick piece of paper), it would be 1km.

Post by **Chupacabra** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 3:39 am

ToxicBug wrote:Even if I tripled the height with every fold, if the piece of paper was 0.1mm thick, 0.1*100³=100m. If it was 1mm thick (that is one fucking thick piece of paper), it would be 1km.

isnt it more like 3^100 (or 2^100 in julios's case)? or maybe im mistaken?

Post by **werldhed** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 3:39 am

Sort of, but it doesn't have anything to do with being ubable to fold in half. It's all about doubling the thickness each time.

Pick an arbitrary number for the width of paper... say 0.000001 meters. Multiply that by 2^100 and that's the thickness of your result, in meters.

edit: oops...meant to be directed at Bluegene
edit2: Chupacabra has it right

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 3:41 am

Chupacabra wrote:
ToxicBug wrote:Even if I tripled the height with every fold, if the piece of paper was 0.1mm thick, 0.1*100³=100m. If it was 1mm thick (that is one fucking thick piece of paper), it would be 1km.
isnt it more like 3^100 (or 2^100 in julios's case)? or maybe im mistaken?

Oh, ic.

Post by **sliver** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 6:38 am

[xeno]Julios wrote:nice video - i'm almost certain i saw it about 15 years ago at some disney land type place or something.

reminds me of the question about folding a thin sheet of paper in half, 100 times.

the resultant thickness will be about the radius of the universe (14 billion lightyears)

I remember seeing it at the [Ontario] Science Centre when I was little, so that's probably what you're thinking of.