explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

Talk:2981: Slingshots

2024-10-07T18:54:23Z

Feyh: Regular slingshot may have caused SOME dinosaur extinction. Not THE dinosaur extinction.

We don't put tables in the transcript, which is supposed to be screen-readable. Tables are not screen-readable. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 04:25, 5 September 2024 (UTC)
:I now see the hidden "Tables are bad?" content in the incomplete transcript notice! Cute! [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 04:33, 5 September 2024 (UTC)
::anybody want to change the transcript? not too confident on how to write it. [[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]] ([[User talk:42.book.addict|talk]]) 17:06, 5 September 2024 (UTC)
:::Given it a go. Could add "regular column" and "gravitational column" pre-descriptors to each subsequent pair of row elements, or go the other way and remove the [Row N] bit. Also chose to use the [label]s of [Tick] and [Cross] in place of the 'fancy' characters; could have gone with [Ticked], [Marked with a tick], [Affirmed], etc, but this seemed sensible. Obviously still open for editing.
:::If I'd have started from scratch, I would have used the (previously identical) table-markup version in the Explanation but have put the "Yay/Nay/freetext" explanation in there with it. But that's not to say that it doesn't look fairly ok (if not better?) in the paragraph-by-paragraph treatment as it currently is, with the table there as visual repeat only.
:::YMMV on all aspects of my choice/complicit acceptance, naturally. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.194.143|172.69.194.143]] 18:20, 5 September 2024 (UTC)
::::Looks great! Thanks. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 21:03, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

We should clarify that it's the American Dennis and not the British one. There are differences, which I learned the hard way :( [[Special:Contributions/172.69.43.184|172.69.43.184]] 06:48, 5 September 2024 (UTC)
:I expanded (and moved to a Trivia section) the interesting facts of this coincidence. (And I didn't add [https://www.plagiarismtoday.com/2010/10/18/the-odd-case-of-dennis-the-menace/ this link there], but maybe it's of "not even Trivia" interest, so you can have it here instead.) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.86.37|172.70.86.37]] 10:53, 5 September 2024 (UTC)
:This case is pretty clearly the US one; there is no "Mr Wilson" in the UK comic... though I'm going to go out on a limb and assert that ''if there was'', he would assuredly be terrorised by Dennis. And Gnasher. (The US is really missing out on Gnasher!) --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.48|162.158.74.48]] 09:02, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

I'm really surprised that "regular slingshot" is "no" for spacecraft instead of something like "not yet". [[User:SystemParadox|SystemParadox]] ([[User talk:SystemParadox|talk]]) 09:46, 5 September 2024 (UTC)
:There's definitely spring-type "delivery systems" (analogues of the elastic slingshots, arguably) which hasten the detatchment of items on a multi-launch 'racked' delivery system. There's also the (proposed, SFAIK not yet tried in anger) rotating-tether release system, akin to biblical sling(shot)s, that would actually be what the gravitational slingshot is most similar to by pure analogy.
:If we ever get a space-elevator and 'drop' things off from the counterweight station, then that would effectively be a biblical slingshot on a planetary scale. (If we time the drop right, or very wrong, with a heavy enough load or even most of the counterweight itself, such that it ends up eventually impacting Earth or any other inhabited lump of rock, it could well also be a matter of a ''planetary'' slingshot with effects on a ''biblical'' scale!) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.86.37|172.70.86.37]] 10:53, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

Gravitational slingshot & Used for Sport shooting would also be a "not yet".
Imagine a couple of millenia from now, where gravitational slingshoting is a sport, and is called shooting for one of many reasons.
ok, fair. It's a stretch. But I felt I had to mention it.
[[Special:Contributions/162.158.222.142|162.158.222.142]] 12:45, 5 September 2024 (UTC)
: In Futurama they use Gravitational slingshot for [https://futurama.fandom.com/wiki/Leo_Wong%27s_%22Miniature%22_Golf_Course "Miniature" golf]

This comic comes the same week as the release of a movie called Slingshot about the gravitational kind.

Isn't David supposed to be using a sling in his fight with Goliath, not a slingshot? That is, a long bit of material that you can use to throw a projectile with higher velocity? There seems to be similar confusion in describing a slingshot as using "mechanical advantage and rotation". A slingshot doesn't really involve rotation, nor does it involve mechanical advantage, really. Mechanical advantage is force amplification, right? And most slingshots don't amplify force, they simply are better than human bodies at delivering that force while moving quickly - that is, they amplify power. Maybe that's splitting hairs. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.71.102|172.68.71.102]] 14:52, 5 September 2024 (UTC)
: I see now that the text has been edited, distinguishing a sling as "an earlier form" of the slingshot. I still don't think that's accurate. They both accelerate a projectile, but they're not at all the same mechanism. Slingshots store deformation energy, and slings store kinetic energy. If we're talking ancient weapons that a slingshot is comparable to, it's far more like a bow than it is a sling. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.22.58|172.71.22.58]] 15:16, 5 September 2024 (UTC)
:: Indeed, the [https://www.etymonline.com/word/slingshot etymologists] tell us that "hand-held implement for throwing stones" is the original meaning of the word "sling", and it dates to 1300. Whereas "slingshot", with "hand catapult" given as a synonym (implying the cleft-stick version), dates only from 1849. The etymologists also tell us that, by the 14th century, "sling" had acquired the additional meaning of "loop for carrying heavy objects", and, by the 18th century, "cloth for suspending an injured arm". These meanings, I argue, gained prominence, while the sling (weapon) fell out of favor, in armies and in language. I daresay that a person with deir arm in a sling would shudder at the prospect of that arm being hurled at an oncoming foe. It appears to me that, at least in the USA where I reside, "slingshot" is now applied to both the "hand catapult" and the "sling (weapon)" to avoid confusion with the sling (object carrier). [[Special:Contributions/172.68.23.190|172.68.23.190]] 15:42, 5 September 2024 (UTC)
::: I'm also in the US, but slingshot to me specifically evokes something where you store and release elastic energy. People often *hear* sling and think it's referring to a slingshot, because they're unfamiliar with an actual sling (weapon). Although slingshot and sling are certainly etymologically related, they are not technologically related. You might argue that a "gravitational slingshot" is a misnomer, in that its arc around a body is more akin to a sling than to a slingshot, I suppose. But a sling is not an earlier form of the "regular slingshot" in this comic. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.31.46|172.71.31.46]] 16:56, 5 September 2024 (UTC)
:::: See the excellent comment below. Instances of this sort of thing abound, porque Inglés es loco. Even in the sciences. A cylindrical, motile structure responsible for motion of, or circulation of water currents around, eukaryotic cells is termed a "flagellum" if it's moving sperm, or a "cilium" if it's moving phlegm on the surface of the trachea. There is no structural or functional difference between the "flagellum" and the "cilium" of these cells, but there are plenty between the "flagellum" of sperm cells and the "flagellum" found on some bacterial cells. However, an attempt to use a common term ({{w|Undulipodium|undulipodium}}) for the common structure was shouted down. The preference was to retain imprecise terms that were understood by some of the people some of the time, rather than trying to adopt a precise term that was understood by nobody. Vox populi, vox Dei. Even if it's illogical. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.41.181|162.158.41.181]] 19:32, 5 September 2024 (UTC)
::::: We're not here explaining all the nuances of regional linguistic differences (and, to be clear, I enjoy those linguistic differences and have found the discussion here interesting). We're explaining what this particular comic means. Randall is from the US. Particularly given the reference to Dennis the Menace, who is frequently portrayed with an elastic band slingshot (which, interestingly enough, is common to both the US and British cartoon characters), and rarely if ever with a sling, it's clear that the former is the subject of this comic. And if, in fact, Randall intended to refer to a sling, it would be quite strange to refer to "an earlier form", because slings today are still basically the same as they were in ancient times. The explanation posits a link which does not exist between slings and slingshots. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.154.98|162.158.154.98]] 14:14, 6 September 2024 (UTC)
:::::: When I 'arrived', it did not posit a link, it just downright said that Dennis was using what might be called a Shepherd's Sling (which is an ancient weapon), and it needed rewording to restate it as the far more recent Hand Catapult. Arguably, as a modern solution to the idea of throwing stones with great force, it might be said to be a ''spiritual'' improvement on the old design (whether or not there are still reasons to keep up the 'old type', including still vastly greater chucking-velocities (at the expense of accuracy issues by those who haven't practiced a ''lot''!) and the ability to use much more available 'chord').
:::::: You know, like the info about the UK version of Dennis, it might be a candidate for moving to Trivia (auxilliary facts not directly tied in with the comic but might be linked to it in some minds). I might try that. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.86.146|172.70.86.146]] 14:44, 6 September 2024 (UTC)
:::::::: (Follow-up, having been 172.70.86.146, immediately above...) Well, I did it! And edited out errors/edited in more slight changes. Let the Wiki Gods assess the results and, through their incarnations through such vessels as other editors, do what more (or less) they consider worthy of their worship and sacrifice! (i.e., over to every other random editor here... At least until I get more/different inspiration of my own. :p ) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.163.49|172.70.163.49]] 15:44, 6 September 2024 (UTC)
::::::: FWIW, a websearch on strings such as "David Goliath slingshot" returns many hits. Some of these do indeed distinguish between the sling (weapon) and the slingshot, but others don't. I like the "Trivia" idea, in conjunction with the (currently) extant text.[[Special:Contributions/172.71.150.113|172.71.150.113]] 15:36, 6 September 2024 (UTC)
:: I come from where the Y-Stick-with-rubber-'bowstring' is termed a catapult, and always associated "slingshot" as being the "shot" (projectile) that was slung (either in a David/Golith 'swung sling' or a Dennise The Menace 'pulled elastic' version), where actually deliberately manufactured/harvested beforehand (typically cast lead, as per muskets, or else specific riverbed pebbles) for consistency of mass and convenience of size rather than just relying upon randomly available rocks and stones grabbed from the ground-clutter as and when needed.
:: But when I went looking for references, it seems there's a general merging of terms (apparently also "pea-shooter", among others, although I'd say ''that'' was a short blowpipe/thick straw that a dried pea or pea-sized wad of mashed up paper can be quickly expelled from just by lung-power). And while some 'catapults' might also be the slung type, with the neolithic-era "stout cords and cradle" design, generally the comic-book type (rather than full blown onagers, mangonels or trebuchets) match what both UK and US alternatives of Dennis tend to use, so clearly that's what Randall is talking about. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.27|172.70.91.27]] 17:23, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

I vote we use gravitational slingshots to hunt stray probes. Anyone wanna try taking down Voyager I? [[Special:Contributions/172.69.90.237|172.69.90.237]] 14:57, 5 September 2024 (UTC)
:If we fire at Voyager I (or II, especially) and perhaps ''miss'', we then likely set a new record for fastest/furthest object sent out into the universe by man. Win-Win! [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.27|172.70.91.27]] 17:23, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

"...such slingshots, which ''may be called "wrist rockets"''." Not without consent from Saunders. ''Saunders introduced the world’s [https://sausa.com/product-category/wrist-rocket-sling-shots/wrist-rockets/ first wrist-braced slingshot in 1954, the Wrist-Rocket®].'' But I am not sure it needs to be mentioned: the Saunders device is only one of many, and not specifically called for in the cartoon. [[User:PRR|PRR]] ([[User talk:PRR|talk]]) 22:07, 5 September 2024 (UTC)
: "In New York, for example, slingshots with a wrist-brace are illegal under § 265.01 of the New York Penal Code. Possession this style slingshot (often referred to as a “wrist-rocket”) is a misdemeanor, regardless of its intended use." On this evidence, "wrist rocket" has entered the 'lower-case domain', Saunders notwithstanding ... as have nouns like "kleenex" or verbs like "to google".[[Special:Contributions/172.71.150.216|172.71.150.216]] 05:35, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

If we're being honest, everything has an online enthusiast community. [[User:Trogdor147|Trogdor147]] ([[User_talk:Trogdor147|talk]]) 01:09, 6 September 2024 (UTC)
: Perhaps not. There used to be an "everything" subreddit, but it was flagged "mature content" (why are we not surprised) and then banned for particularly unsavory TOS violations (ditto). [https://www.dude-n-dude.com/2023/02/16/ai-the-hero-of-the-hour/ Humans can't have nice things], I guess. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.150.129|172.71.150.129]] 19:47, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

I'm a fan of drag racing, so I know another usage for the word "slingshot". It's the name for a specific configuration of front engine dragster. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Front_engine_dragster The driver sits at the very rear of the vehicle, behind the engine, transmission and drive wheels.] [[User:These Are Not The Comments You Are Looking For|These Are Not The Comments You Are Looking For]] ([[User talk:These Are Not The Comments You Are Looking For|talk]]) 03:31, 8 September 2024 (UTC)
:With apologies to your brand of "drag racing", but I initially thought you were invoking the {{w|RuPaul's Drag Race|other kind}}. After all, they would have reason to talk of the {{w|Slingback}}, so why not a 'Slingshot'?
:Though, bearing in mind that I'm still at this point rapidly thinking about what few things I know about (the other) 'drag racing', now you're talking of the "front engine", and I'm wondering if this is perhaps not to do with footwear but instead an unusual euphamism for... {{w|Codpiece|something}}..? ;) (Possibly as the stylistic opposite to {{w|Tucking|the alternative}}. A form of 'sling' could be involved; and surely it ''has'' a name, but I wouldn't know what.)
:With apologies for rapidly changing the tone, but I had an internal chuckle when I then worked out where my premise was going wrong in the first place.
:And that wikipedia page (BTW, using the {{template|w}} linking method is better than []ing the wikipedia URL) was interesting. Could do with some further info and (non-red) onward links.
:Seems not to mention that in making a front-wheel-drive chassis a rear-wheel "slingshot" by removing the rear wheels, they also had to add those token "even more front" wheels (it's obvious they did, but reading the text makes it sound like you end up with a strictly {{w|Two-wheel tractor|single-axle}} transverse two-wheeler configuration. Which sounds slightly more safe to ride than a {{w|Monowheel}}, at least as long as you don't get vastly uneven drive torques between wheels. But I'm sure someone has tried to do it in a dragster-like format! [[Special:Contributions/172.69.43.168|172.69.43.168]] 12:15, 8 September 2024 (UTC)

The fifth category says that (probably not, but possibly) regular slingshot may have caused the extinction of some dinosaurs species. Avian dinosaurs, obviously, as those are the one existing among documented regular slingshot user species. The current explanation assumes the text reffers only to the Cretaceous-tertiary Extinction. [[User:Feyh|Feyh]] ([[User talk:Feyh|talk]]) 18:54, 7 October 2024 (UTC)

Talk:2419: Hug Count

2021-02-02T02:25:39Z

Feyh:

I don't know how this makes me feel. I just don't hug. Maybe a couple of female relatives as I leave the traditional Christmas gathering (that didn't happen in 2020) because ''they'' expect it of me. But some societies (I'll namecheck the Italians, but there are many others) would possibly break those totals in a day (pre-Covid) just by going to the market-place and sealing deals with the local tradespeople. So my chart dipped drastically ast year, but not so much by absolute count. (No, not looking for sympathy, or virtual hugs, just saying...) [[Special:Contributions/141.101.77.126|141.101.77.126]] 23:33, 1 February 2021 (UTC)

What happened in 2007? Seems like a sizeable spike. Being in a reception line at a wedding, for instance? [[Special:Contributions/173.245.54.211|173.245.54.211]] 23:43, 1 February 2021 (UTC)

No citation. Is this Randall's personal chart, do you figure? [[User:Ekedolphin|Ekedolphin]] ([[User talk:Ekedolphin|talk]]) 00:18, 2 February 2021 (UTC)

2007 was the year of the xkcd meetup, which involved a lot of hugs, some of which may have involved Randall. Randall also moved from Virginia to Massachusetts that year, which may have resulted in separate small groups of people hugged in the same year. (Both of these facts are mentioned in his blog post from that October 1st.) [[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.56|108.162.219.56]] 01:35, 2 February 2021 (UTC)

The {{w|Free Hugs Campaign}} peaked between 2006 and 2007.

2319: Large Number Formats

2021-01-05T12:42:58Z

Feyh: It is 2.54 cm/inches, not 2.54 inches/cm. Math is correct in spite of the typo.

{{comic
| number = 2319
| date = June 12, 2020
| title = Large Number Formats
| image = large number formats-2.png
| titletext = 10^13.4024: A person who has come back to numbers after a journey deep into some random theoretical field
}}

==Explanation==
This comic shows what the way you write large numbers says about you. Different people use different methods to express large numbers. And this comic claims it can tell something about you based on the way you format large numbers. In this way, the comic is similar in idea to [[977: Map Projections]], where it was your choice of map projections that could tell something about you.

See the [[#Table of types|table]] below for each of the 10 different ways to express large numbers, plus the 11th mentioned in the title text.

The number used as an example is the [https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=Distance+to+Jupiter+in+inches approximate distance] from the planet {{w|Earth}} to the planet {{w|Jupiter}} as of the release day of the comic on June 12th 2020, in {{w|inch|inches}} (1 inch = 2.54 cm).

Two days after the release of the comic the following text could be found on [https://theskylive.com/jupiter-info Jupiter info] on [https://theskylive.com/ The Sky Live].
:The distance of Jupiter from Earth is currently 640,084,108 kilometers, equivalent to 4.278698 Astronomical Units. Light takes 35 minutes and 35.0908 seconds to travel from Jupiter and arrive on Earth.

64,008,410,800,000 cm / 2.54 cm/inches = 25,200,161,732,283 inches - much less than the number used in the comic. But Jupiter's distance to Earth changes quite quickly, and was decreasing at the time of the release of the comic.

According to a graph of the distance as a function of time on The Sky Live, the distance on the release day was 643,1 million km. This will give 25,313 which the used number will round to.

The used number 25,259,974,097,204 is equivalent to 641,6 million km. On June 13th the distance is given as 641,7 million km in the graph on The Sky Live, very close to the number used. As this was the day after the release of this comic, it seems like [[Randall]] used a different distance than the exact one for the release day. He may have also used an average for June which would be 642 million km based on the average of the distance on June and July 1st.

==Table of types==
{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Number
! Type of person
! Notes
|-
| 25,259,974,097,204
| Normal Person
| This is the full number, 25259974097204, written out in the normal fashion, with commas to indicate powers of 1000. Although writing out the number in full is indeed a common action for normal people, the specific comma convention depicted here is only considered normal in the anglophone world; conventions for writing large numbers in full vary considerably across cultures. For example, in countries where the period is used as a {{w|decimal separator}} (including Europe outside the UK), one would write the number as 25.259.974.097.204 (or 25'259'974'097'204 in Switzerland, or 25 259 974 097 204 in Poland, France and Estonia). Under the {{w|Indian numbering system}}, this number would be written as 2,52,59,97,40,97,204 or “two nil, fifty-two kharab, fifty-nine arab, ninety-seven crore, forty lakh, ninety-seven thousand, two hundred and four.”
|-
| 25 Trillion
| Normal Person
| This is the number, rounded to trillions in the normal fashion.
|-
| 25 Billion
| Old British Person
| In current English usage, across the Anglophonic world with some hold-outs, an n-illion means 10^(3n+3) as per the {{w|short scale}} system popularised by American influence in international trade, so a trillion means 10^12, as above. However, older British English use had an n-illion meaning 10^(6n) (i.e. the simpler calculation of ''million^n''), so a billion meant 10^12. The change stems from a 1974 commitment by Harold Wilson, the Prime Minister of the UK at the time, to change from the {{w|long scale}} (previously often described as the British system) to the short one for all official purposes.

Though not instantly widely adopted for common usage, the mid-'70s could therefore be considered the key turning point between when an older or younger British person learns (as the change filters through the system at various stages of education) what their "Billion"s and "Trillion"s are supposed to represent.

As well as 'traditionalist' British use, the long scale is widely used in the non-Anglophone world, in local language versions, though while the British system tended to infill n-and-a-half powers of the million with the term "thousand n-illion", the suffix "-illi''ard''", or equivalent, is often used for the thousands multiple directly atop the respective "-illion" point.
|-
|2.526x1013
|Scientist
|This number is formatted in {{w|scientific notation}}, using the exponent 1013.
|-
| 2.525997x1013
| Scientist trying to avoid rounding up
| Using as many decimal places as necessary until hitting a digit (0-4) that results in rounding down, even if it goes against the common scientific practice of reporting the correct amount of "significant figures". [[:File:large number formats.png|A previous version of the comic]] had a typo (the number was ''2.5997x1013''), but Randall updated the comic.
|-
| 2.526e13 or
2.526*10^13
| Software developer
| The first example is how the number would be expressed as a floating point number in scientific notation in [https://rosettacode.org/wiki/Literals/Floating_point most common programming languages]. The second example is a technically correct way of expressing the same thing in some programming languages in which exponentiation is indicated by the ^ operator. However writing it that way instead of the first way could be considered quirky, as it is written as an instruction to the computer to calculate the product of a number with 10 raised to power 13, instead of just writing the number (although in many situations the compiler or preprocessor would detect this and solve it correctly, making it functionally identical to the first case). A software developer might write it that way if they are a novice who is not familiar with the first notation, or they could simply have an personal preference that considers the second version easier to read. Perhaps an additional joke for the second version is that it is the standard scientific notation with the x for multiplication and superscript for raising to a power replaced with the notation used in many programming languages of * and ^, i.e., a software developer writing down a number in scientific notation, not necessarily while writing a program, would by habit write a * for multiplication and a ^ for exponentiation.
|-
| 25,259,973,541,888
| Software developer who forgot about floats
| The two most common computer {{w|Floating-point arithmetic|floating-point}} formats are the IEEE 754 {{w|Single-precision floating-point format|single-precision}} and {{w|Double-precision floating-point format|double-precision}} representations. These are ''binary'' floating-point formats, representing numbers as the quantity ''a'' × 2''e'', for some fractional number ''a'' and exponent ''e''. Both the values ''a'' and ''e'' have a fixed size in bits, and therefore a finite range. In single-precision, ''a'' and ''e'' have (effectively) 24 and 8 bits, respectively, while in double precision the effective sizes are 53 and 11 bits.

Fully representing the number 25,259,974,097,204 (in any format) requires at least 45 bits. Therefore this number cannot be represented exactly as a single-precision float. The closest possible representations are 0.717931628 × 245 and 0.717931688 × 245; these work out to 25,259,973,541,888 and 25,259,975,639,040, respectively. Of these, the one ending in 888 is considerably closer to the original, so is chosen due to {{w|rounding}}. (Naturally these numbers are represented internally in binary, not decimal; the actual representations, in {{w|hexadecimal}}, are <tt>0.b7ca5e</tt> × 2<tt></tt>2d and <tt>0.b7ca5f</tt> × 2<tt></tt>2d.)

In many programming languages, the keyword to request a single-precision floating-point variable is <tt>float</tt>, while the keyword to request double-precision is <tt>double</tt>. It is an easy mistake to make to forget about the limited precision available with type <tt>float</tt>, especially since its name sounds like what you want for "floating point". (Had the programmer remembered to use type <tt>double</tt>, the number 25,259,974,097,204 could have been represented exactly (still in hexadecimal), as <tt>0.b7ca5e43c9a000</tt> × 2<tt></tt>2d.)
|-
| 1013
| Astronomer
| For extremely large distances, astronomers typically only care about orders of magnitude, e.g. whether a number is 1013, as opposed to 1012 or 1014. Randall often jokes about the lack of precision needed by astronomers, such as in [[2205: Types of Approximation]] where the astronomer-cosmologist is equally willing to make pi equal to one, or ten. The original number is rounded to the nearest power of ten.
|-
| {∅,{∅},{∅,{∅}},{∅,{∅},{...
| Set theorist
| The natural numbers can be constructed in a {{w|set theory}} in various ways. In the most common of these, the {{w|Natural_number#Von_Neumann_ordinals|Von Neumann ordinals}}, the natural numbers are defined recursively by letting 0 = ∅ (the {{w|empty set}}), and ''n'' + 1 = ''n'' ∪ {''n''}. So, every natural number ''n'' is the set of all natural numbers less than ''n'', and since 0 is defined as the empty set, all numbers are nested sets of empty sets. Note that writing out a number in this form requires an exponential number of characters - that is, ''n'' + 1 requires over twice the characters as ''n'' does to write out. Thus, this method could not be finished, as it would require more data to be stored than there is matter in the universe to store it.
|-
| 1,262,998,704,860 score and four
| Abraham Lincoln
| In the {{W|Gettysburg Address}}, Lincoln speaks the number "87" as "four score and seven" ("score" meaning "20"). Base-20 or {{w|vigesimal}} numeral systems are or have been used in pre-Columbian-American, African and many other cultures. In French it is used only for higher numbers (e.g. 92 = quatre-vingt-douze). In English it can appear in certain archaic and classic contexts, such as the King James translation of the Bible ("threescore years and ten" to be the life expectancy of a human according to Psalm 90:10). In these cases, a number is written in "score" (multiples of 20) plus a remainder. In this case 1,262,998,704,860 * 20 + 4 yields the exact number.
|-
| 10^13.4024 ''(title text)''
| A person who has come back to numbers after a journey deep into some random theoretical field
| In some fields of mathematics, especially those dealing with very {{w|large numbers}}, numbers are sometimes represented by raising ten (or some other convenient base) to an oddly precise power, to facilitate comparison of their magnitudes without filling up pages upon pages of digits. An example of this is {{w|Skewes's number}}, which is formally calculated to be ''e''''e''''e''79, but is more commonly approximated as 10101034. 13.4024 is a rounded version of the {{w|common logarithm}} of 25,259,974,097,204 (log10 25,259,974,097,204 = 13.4024329009); thus, this "format" is still mathematically correct, but uncommon. However, only by using many more digits will the result get close enough to be rounded to the original number 10^13.40243290087302 = 25,259,974,097,203.5, which would round up to the correct number. The number from the title text, 10^13.4024 = 25,258,060,548,319.6, differs from the original number by over a billion.
|}

==Transcript==
:[A panel only with text. At the top there is four lines of explanatory text. Below that are 2 columns with 5 rows of number formats. Each numerical format is in red, with black text explaining the format below it.]

:<big>What the way you write large numbers says about you</big>
:(Using the approximate current distance to Jupiter in inches as an example)

:25,259,974,097,204
:Normal person

:25 trillion
:Normal person

:25 billion
:Old British person

:2.526x1013
:Scientist

:2.525997x1013
:Scientist trying to avoid rounding up

:2.526e13 or 2.526*10^13
:Software developer

:25,259,973,541,888
:Software developer who forgot about floats

:1013
:Astronomer

:{∅,{∅},{∅,{∅}},{∅,{∅},{...
:Set theorist

:1,262,998,704,860 score and four
:Abraham Lincoln

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Programming]]
[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Astronomy]]
[[Category:Science]]
[[Category:Comics featuring politicians]]