Googol

A googol is the large number 10100. In

decimal notation, it is written as the digit 1
followed by one hundred zeroes: 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,​000,​000,
000,​000,​000,​000,​000. Its systematic
name is 10 duotrigintillion. (The short
scale names are standard in the English-
speaking world.) Its prime factorization is

Etymology

The term was coined in 1920 by 9-year-old

Milton Sirotta (1911–1981), nephew of
U.S. mathematician Edward Kasner.[1] He
may have been inspired by the
contemporary comic strip character
Barney Google.[2] Kasner popularized the
concept in his 1940 book Mathematics and
the Imagination.[3] Other names for this
quantity include ten duotrigintillion on the
short scale,[4] ten thousand sexdecillion on
the long scale, or ten sexdecilliard on the
Peletier long scale.

Size

A googol has no special significance in

mathematics. However, it is useful when
comparing with other very large quantities
such as the number of subatomic particles
in the visible universe or the number of
hypothetical possibilities in a chess game.
Kasner used it to illustrate the difference
between an unimaginably large number
and infinity, and in this role it is sometimes
used in teaching mathematics. To put in
perspective the size of a googol, the mass
of an electron, just under 10−30 kg, can be
compared to the mass of the visible
universe, estimated at between 1050 and
1060 kg.[5] It is a ratio in the order of about
1080 to 1090, or at most one ten-billionth of
a googol (0.00000001% of a googol).

Another way of illustrating the immense

size of a googol is to picture the Frontier
supercomputer, which as of 2022 is the
most powerful supercomputer in the world
and measures 680 m2 (7,300 sq ft), almost
exactly the same size of a basketball court
with run-offs and sidelines.[6] The Frontier
is capable of making 1,102,000 TFLOPs
(1.1 quintillion calculations per second). If
the supercomputer was shrunk down to
the size of an atom (for reference, a typical
grain of sand might have 37 quintillion
atoms),[7] and if every atom in the
observable universe (~1080 atoms total[8])
was as powerful as a Frontier
supercomputer, it would take
approximately 100 seconds of parallel
computing to manually add up all the
digits like an adding machine (instead of
using shorthand calculations).

Carl Sagan pointed out that the total

number of elementary particles in the
universe is around 1080 (the Eddington
number) and that if the whole universe
were packed with neutrons so that there
would be no empty space anywhere, there
would be around 10128. He also noted the
similarity of the second calculation to that
of Archimedes in The Sand Reckoner. By
Archimedes's calculation, the universe of
Aristarchus (roughly 2 light years in
diameter), if fully packed with sand, would
contain 1063 grains. If the much larger
observable universe of today were filled
with sand, it would still only equal 1095
grains. Another 100,000 observable
universes filled with sand would be
necessary to make a googol.[9]
The decay time for a supermassive black
hole of roughly 1 galaxy-mass (1011 solar
masses) due to Hawking radiation is on
the order of 10100 years.[10] Therefore, the
heat death of an expanding universe is
lower-bounded to occur at least one
googol years in the future.

A googol is considerably smaller than a

centillion.[11]

Properties

A googol is approximately 70! (factorial of

70).[a] Using an integral, binary numeral
system, one would need 333 bits to
represent a googol, i.e., 1 googol =
 ≈ 2332.19280949. However, a
googol is well within the maximum bounds
of an IEEE 754 double-precision floating
point type, but without full precision in the
mantissa.

Using modular arithmetic, the series of

residues (mod n) of one googol, starting
with mod 1, is as follows:

0, 0, 1, 0, 0, 4, 4, 0, 1, 0, 1, 4, 3, 4, 10, 0, 4,
10, 9, 0, 4, 12, 13, 16, 0, 16, 10, 4, 16, 10,
5, 0, 1, 4, 25, 28, 10, 28, 16, 0, 1, 4, 31, 12,
10, 36, 27, 16, 11, 0, ... (sequence
A066298 in the OEIS)
This sequence is the same as that of the
residues (mod n) of a googolplex up until
the 17th position.

Cultural impact

Widespread sounding of the word occurs

through the name of the company Google,
with the name "Google" being an
accidental misspelling of "googol" by the
company's founders,[12] which was picked
to signify that the search engine was
intended to provide large quantities of
information.[13] In 2004, family members
of Kasner, who had inherited the right to
his book, were considering suing Google
for their use of the term "googol";[14]
however, no suit was ever filed.[15]

Since October 2009, Google has been

assigning domain names to its servers
under the domain "1e100.net", the
scientific notation for 1 googol, in order to
provide a single domain to identify servers
across the Google network.[16][17]

The word is notable for being the subject

of the £1 million question in a 2001
episode of the British quiz show Who
Wants to Be a Millionaire?, when contestant
Charles Ingram cheated his way through
the show with the help of a confederate in
the studio audience.[18]

See also

Googolplex
Graham's number
Skewes' number
Infinity
Names of large numbers

Notes

a. ≈1.1979×10100

References

1 Bi lik C l (J 14 2004) "Th C ld B

1. Bialik, Carl (June
No Google 14,Edward
Without 2004). Kasner"
"There Could
(http Be
s://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10857592492
1724042) . The Wall Street Journal Online.
Archived (https://web.archive.org/web/201
61130145858/http://www.wsj.com/article
s/SB108575924921724042) from the
original on November 30, 2016. (retrieved
March 17, 2015)

2. Ralph Keyes (2021). The Hidden History of

Coined Words (https://books.google.com/b
ooks?id=JYskEAAAQBAJ) . Oxford
University Press. p. 120. ISBN 978-0-19-
046677-0. Extract of page 120 (https://book
s.google.com/books?id=JYskEAAAQBAJ&p
g=PA120)
3. Kasner, Edward; Newman, James R. (1940).
Mathematics and the Imagination (https://b
ooks.google.com/books?id=Ad8hAx-6m9o
C&q=Mathematics%20and%20the%20Imagi
nation&pg=PP1) . Simon and Schuster,
New York. ISBN 0-486-41703-4. Archived (h
ttps://web.archive.org/web/201407030730
29/http://books.google.com/books?id=Ad8
hAx-6m9oC&lpg=PP1&dq=Mathematics%2
0and%20the%20Imagination&pg=PP1)
from the original on 2014-07-03. The
relevant passage about the googol and
googolplex, attributing both of these names
to Kasner's nine-year-old nephew, is
available in James R. Newman, ed. (2000)
[1956]. The world of mathematics, volume
 3. Mineola, New York: Dover Publications.
pp. 2007–2010. ISBN 978-0-486-41151-4.

4. Bromham, Lindell (2016). An Introduction to

Molecular Evolution and Phylogenetics (htt
ps://books.google.com/books?id=Jf9NCw
AAQBAJ) (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Oxford
University Press. p. 494. ISBN 978-0-19-
873636-3. Retrieved April 15, 2022.

5. McPherson, Kristine (2006). Elert, Glenn

(ed.). "Mass of the universe" (https://hypert
extbook.com/facts/2006/KristineMcPhers
on.shtml) . The Physics Factbook.
Retrieved 2019-08-24.
6. "Basketball Court Dimensions & Markings |
Harrod Sport" (https://www.harrodsport.co
m/advice-and-guides/basketball-court-dime
nsions-markings) . www.harrodsport.com.
Retrieved 2022-09-14.

7. Yongsheng, Zhong (2016-07-31). Chinese

Classic Economics (https://books.google.c
om/books?id=IYZcDwAAQBAJ&q=grain+of
+sand&pg=PA70) . Paths International.
ISBN 978-1-84464-467-4.

8. Villanueva, John Carl (2009-07-31). "How

Many Atoms Are There in the Universe?" (ht
tps://www.universetoday.com/36302/atom
s-in-the-universe/) . Universe Today.
Retrieved 2022-09-14.

9. Sagan, Carl (1981). Cosmos. Book Club

Associates. pp. 220–221.
10. Page, Don N. (1976-01-15). "Particle
emission rates from a black hole: Massless
particles from an uncharged, nonrotating
hole". Physical Review D. American
Physical Society (APS). 13 (2): 198–206.
Bibcode:1976PhRvD..13..198P (https://ui.a
dsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1976PhRvD..13..19
8P) . doi:10.1103/physrevd.13.198 (https://
doi.org/10.1103%2Fphysrevd.13.198) .
ISSN 0556-2821 (https://www.worldcat.or
g/issn/0556-2821) . See in particular
equation (27).

11. Stewart, Ian (2017). Infinity: A Very Short

Introduction (https://books.google.com/bo
oks?id=iewwDgAAQBAJ) . New York, NY:
Oxford University Press. p. 20. ISBN 978-0-
19-875523-4. Retrieved April 15, 2022.
12. Koller, David (January 2004). "Origin of the
name "Google" " (https://web.archive.org/w
eb/20120627081942/http://graphics.stanfo
rd.edu/~dk/google_name_origin.html) .
Stanford University. Archived from the
original (http://graphics.stanford.edu/~dk/
google_name_origin.html) on June 27,
2012. Retrieved July 4, 2012.

13. "Google! Beta website" (https://web.archive.

org/web/19990221202430/http://www.goo
gle.com/company.html) . Google, Inc.
Archived from the original (https://www.go
ogle.com/company.html) on February 21,
1999. Retrieved October 12, 2010.
14. "Have your Google people talk to my
'googol' people" (http://articles.baltimoresu
n.com/2004-05-16/entertainment/0405150
243_1_google-googol-internet-search-engin
e) . 16 May 2004. Archived (https://web.arc
hive.org/web/20140904125042/http://articl
es.baltimoresun.com/2004-05-16/entertain
ment/0405150243_1_google-googol-intern
et-search-engine) from the original on
2014-09-04.

15. Nowlan, Robert A. (2017). Masters of

Mathematics: The Problems They Solved,
Why These Are Important, and What You
Should Know about Them. Rotterdam:
Sense Publishers. p. 221. ISBN 978-
9463008938.
16. Cade Metz (8 February 2010). "Google
doppelgänger casts riddle over interwebs"
(https://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/02/0
8/google_mystery_domain/) . The Register.
Archived (https://web.archive.org/web/201
60303180937/https://www.theregister.co.u
k/2010/02/08/google_mystery_domain/)
from the original on 3 March 2016.
Retrieved 30 December 2015.

17. "What is 1e100.net?" (https://support.googl

e.com/faqs/answer/174717?hl=en) .
Google Inc. Archived (https://web.archive.o
rg/web/20160109065331/https://support.g
oogle.com/faqs/answer/174717?hl=en)
from the original on 9 January 2016.
Retrieved 30 December 2015.