26-5-07

26-5-07

I just tried to calculate how thick a piece of paper would be if it were folded in half 50 times. I am a little freaked out by the answer. I used Google to do the sums so if they are wrong... Umm...

So imagine a piece of paper 500 micrometers thick - keeping in mind that a human hair is about 100 micrometers thick. So we can ask Google what number you would get if you started at 500 and doubled it 50 times by writing "(2 ^ 50) * 500 =".

The answer we get from Google is 5.63E+17 micrometers or 563,000,000 kilometers. The distance from the earth to the sun is about 150,000,000 kilometers so the piece of paper folded over 50 times is more than three times the distance!!!

I know all this is irrelevant because you can't fold any piece of paper more than seven times. I have tried on numerous occasions.

All I need now is a chess board and a bag of rice.

by JC