Thursday, April 06, 2006

How big is a billion?

A billion hours ago, our ancestors were living in the Stone Age.

A billion minutes ago, Jesus was barely dead.

A billion seconds ago, it was 1974.

A billion dollars of NZ government spending ago was just 7 days, 2 hours and 24 minutes ago.


(adapted from the Adam Smith blog)

Update; My most cringing apologies. A reader has pointed out that a billion minutes ago Jesus would have been dead 105 years and a billion seconds ago it was 1974!
I did get the bit about govt spending right.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Actually, a billion minutes ago it would have been AD 104, and Jesus would have been quite dead.

And a billion seconds ago, it was 1974, not 1971.

If we are going to measure the size of a billion, lets be accurate.

Anonymous said...

A billion dollars in 7 days, 2 hours, 24 minutes is the equal to $1630 per second!!!