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Subject: Re: Answer is here ...

Author: Mike Byrne

Date: 19:40:42 11/28/02

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On November 28, 2002 at 22:20:02, Tanya Deborah wrote:

>On November 28, 2002 at 22:05:39, Mike Byrne wrote:
>
>>snip
>>>>
>>>>All your answers are welcome...
>>>>
>>>>My best Regards!
>>>>
>>>>Tanya.
>>>
>>>6.5104179521361946395624758693608e+308
>>>
>>>I know this is the exact number of chess positions, because I counted them one
>>>day using my Palm and Chess genius.
>>>
>>>But how do you count all the atoms in the universe?  I might need a newer Palm
>>>for that one ...hmmmm ....yea, I could that on of those new palms.
>>>
>>>Hold on - let me go talk to my wife and explain to her why I need a new palm.
>>>
>>>THANKS - You gave me the perfect reason for a new Palm - to count all the atoms
>>>in the universe.
>>>
>>>eh ...Does anybody want to help?
>>
>>
>>got the answer for atoms - it's right here
>>
>>"
>>It seems, then, that the number of atoms in the Universe is at least about 4e78,
>>but perhaps as many as 6e79. I would suggest 1e79 as a reasonable estimate. That
>>is, 10 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000
>>000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 atoms.
>>"
>>
>
>
>Thanks Mike, very nice page.  But how about the total number of chess
>positions???
>
> ,
>>http://www.sunspot.noao.edu/sunspot/pr/answerbook/universe.html
>>
>>looks like "positions in chess" beats "atoms in the universe" by a fair amount
>>....
>>
>>...now about the 32 man EGTB that I was thinking about - how many drives would I
>>need??
>>
>>
>>;>)


I gave you the number 6.5104179521361946395624758693608e+308 that is 6.5 x10 to
the 308 or just add 308 zeroes ...

6,500,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000

Now that number might be a little high - that was assuming on average of  35
moves for 100 moves or 200 ply.  35^200 is 6.5e308.  Most papers underestimate
the number of games to about 1e110 or so.  But even a 35 move game for 50 moves
or 100 ply will give you 2.5e154 (35^100) amd that is still larger than the
number of atoms in the universe.

We know it's finite number and that it's more than the number of atoms in the
universe - I happened to write an English paper on this over 20 years ago.

Now those many numbers - others come up with their own numbers - here's one I
just found on google by searching "legal chess games" his number is "just" under
my number I quickly calculated above by a factor of a 140 trillon or so.  (if
you were off by factor of 10 -- you would be 10x off so we're talking
140,000,000,000,000X - but what's a few hundred trillion between friends?  ;>)

http://cypherpunks.venona.com/date/1994/04/msg00023.html

Michael




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