[meteorite-list] Fw: term definitions and usage

[MexicoDoug]

Michael,Andre, and Leo

A"billion" in Mexico is even scarier than the two versions in the 
USAand Europe. Like Leo says, from Spain, 10^9 is "a thousand 
million"is common, but the proximity to the US and 
overflow/translations of news havemade it a big mess in meaning - at 
least in the northeast and"billion" for 10^9 is often used, erroneous 
or not, and I must admitto never hearing anyone use a billion for 
10^12, but it must be.

Thatwas a very complete website link on big numbers, Andre, thanks.

Randy,

Perfectfollow-up - as corny as I may sound, may I add that 
your/his"nano-gigaannum" joke is "timeless" ;-) Must have been fun to 
watch as a young entrant (and think ... I'm never going to turn into 
that...)  I still use mya,habits are hard to break when they seem to 
flow so easily, like writing"I'm" instead of "I am".

Everyone/

Iwon't forget my extended trip to Pakistan some time ago. Over there 
and inIndia, when speaking of the value of a house, for example, the 
base big unit isa lakh (rupee). It is 100,000. Took a little adjustment 
since everything inEurope and the Americas is based on triplets of 
zeros. I was all giddy feelinglike Johnny Quest as soon as I mastered 
the concept of lakh and used it everychance I got...

Thetrivial name differences between the long and short 
European/American systemmight be humorous to some of them, everyone is 
always finds some cultural thingto defend for the preservation of life 
and liberty (similar to Randy's account).Just three years ago at a 
major star party I was discussing my meteorites withsomeone in the chow 
line and one of the (few) women flipped out when she heardme speak of 
grams, "This is America, speak American - we use ounceshere!" I was 
admonished very sharply. I was hungry so the answer was 'yes,ma'am', 
but dinner didn't taste so good as it should have for some sad 
reason... something to do with being at a gathering of fellow 
astronomers...

Correctme if I'm wrong, but are big Chinese numbers are based on 
[10^4]^i.

Kindestwishes

Doug
(This is a resend since a lightening strike resent my email to RTF and 
this post in its original form didn't go through to the general list)

 

 




-----Original Message-----
From: Randy Korotev <korotev at wustl.edu>
To: meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com
Sent: Mon, Jul 25, 2011 11:52 am
Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] Fw: term definitions and usage


I attended my first scientific conference as a graduate student 
sometime in the early 70's.  My first exposure to lunar geochronology 
was a session I attended at that conference.  I was surprised to learn 
that the community of isotope geochronologists was very contentious to 
the point of being insulting and rude.  After nearly every talk 
somebody got up and asked a pointed question or made a damning comment. 
 
After one talk someone in the audience got up and chastised the speaker 
for having presented all his age data with the units "byr."  The 
chastiser was very adamant that "billion years" was an obsolete and a 
just-plain-wrong term, in part because the word billion means a 
different things in America and Britain.  "The proper term is Ga for 
gigaannum (you idiot)!" 
 
The next speaker got up and started his talk like this: "A nano 
gigaannum ago at this conference we presented some data..."  It took 
almost until the end of the sentence for the audience to appreciate the 
joke and erupt into laughter. 
 
Randy Korotev   
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