Timeline for Reconstructing the argument that yields Graham's number
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
7 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Feb 8, 2018 at 17:35 | comment | added | shreevatsa | A related answer on math.SE for a general audience, by user @MJD: Graham's Number: why so big? | |
| Jan 11, 2013 at 19:55 | vote | accept | Timothy Chow | ||
| Jan 11, 2013 at 17:26 | answer | added | John Baez | timeline score: 24 | |
| Dec 22, 2012 at 13:20 | comment | added | Todd Trimble | My daughter (who is 8) and I were discussing large numbers some time back, and I said to her that mathematicians sometimes talk about this indescribably large number called Graham's number, that you couldn't write down in ordinary (decimal) notation even if you filled the universe with numbers. This has come back to haunt me with some frequency. I think she thinks it's effectively infinite. Perhaps I have a budding ultrafinitist on my hands. | |
| Dec 22, 2012 at 4:22 | comment | added | Tom Leinster | I once unwisely told a taxi driver in Glasgow that I was a mathematician. He got excited and said, "So what's the biggest number then?" I ummed and ahhed, trying to think up a good diplomatic answer, when he interrupted and said "It's Graham's number, isn't it?" Now that's cult status. | |
| Dec 22, 2012 at 4:14 | comment | added | Richard Stanley | Though irrelevant to Tim's question, Graham's number is small potatoes compared to some of the numbers cooked up by Harvey Friedman, e.g., his paper Long finite sequences, JCT(A) 95 (2001), 102-144. | |
| Dec 22, 2012 at 3:43 | history | asked | Timothy Chow | CC BY-SA 3.0 |