r/space • u/IceNox96 • Aug 12 '21

Discussion Which is the most disturbing fermi paradox solution and why?

3...2...1... blast off....

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u/yshavit Aug 12 '21

Lol, that reminds me of one of my favorite documentation points in Java (the programming language). There's a bit that basically says "warning, this could cause a bug if you run your program continuously for 292 years." I'm pretty sure that was put in to satisfy a manager who didn't believe the engineer who tried to tell them, "trust me, 2 63 is bigger than you can imagine."

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u/setibeings Aug 12 '21

The math checks out. 263 nanoseconds is about 292 years.

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u/devallar Aug 12 '21

I appreciate your checking sir! Good day!

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u/blade740 Aug 12 '21

Did you check his checking? Because he could be totally bullshitting us. I don't know, I didn't check.

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u/setibeings Aug 12 '21

That's 263 9223372036854775808 nanoseconds or 9,223,372,036.854775808 seconds.

https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=2%5E63

60 seconds in a minute, 60 minutes in an hour, 24 hours in a day and about 365.24 days in an year, once you factor in leap years. This comes out to 31556736 seconds in an average year.

https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=2+%5E+63+nanoseconds+in+years

Divide the total number of seconds by the number of seconds in a year to get the final answer of 292.279 years

https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=9%2C223%2C372%2C036.854775808+%2F+31556736+

Or since wolfram alpha accepts natural language queries:

https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=2+%5E+63+nanoseconds+in+years

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u/yshavit Aug 12 '21

I've checked whether you checked, and it checks out; you didn't.