Which Contains More?

Exercises in back-of-the-envelope estimating:

A. Which quantity is greater, the words in an average book, or the notes in an average album?

B. Leaves on a tree or gallons of water in a swimming pool?

C. Cheerios in a box or kids in a high school?

D. All the people who have ever lived, or the stars in the Milky Way?

E. Gallons of gasoline consumed annually in the US or McDonald's burgers?

This all seem obvious, except for the first one. But I'm guessing it's words.

A. Words
B. Leaves
C. Cheerios
D. Stars
E. Gasoline

Huh, this turned out to be more interesting than I thought.  I made up these questions without looking up the answers, just trying to think of things that might be in the same order of magnitude.  On some I was pretty close.  Others WAY off.

A. Average novel = 80-100,000 words
   Average album = 60 minutes @ 120 bpm = 7200 beats, figure 4? musical instruments playing = 28,800 notes?

B. Leaves on a tree = 2-500,000
   Gallons in a pool = 106,000 for non-Olympic size, 660,000 for Olympic

C. Cheerios = 4500 (16 oz box)
    Kids = 800-1600

D. People ever born = 107B
   Stars in Milky way = 100B-400B

E. Gas consumed = 136B gal
   Burgers consumed = 50B

The pool question is problematical. For the number you provide, you maybe should have specified public or competition pools. 106,000 gallons is a damned big pool, just over 14,000 cubic feet. The typical  home pool is maybe 12,000 to 20,000 gallons.

The only numbers I have seen recently for stars in the Milky Way are 200-300 billion. 100 billion is so twentieth century.

And when's the last time you bought an album that had sixty minutes of music? They're more like forty these days, aren't they?

If McDonald's was depending on me for their sales, the figure would have been zero.

Clever post in any case. Thanks. It made me think a bit, which I really hate doing (as is often displayed by my posts).

Try this without looking up anything. Or maybe look up only one of the items in each.

Which is heavier?

1. A Boeing 747 or the average American house?

2. My pool table or the LA Clippers starting lineup?

3. A high-quality billiard ball or an iPhone 4S?

The 747 has to fly, so I say the house.

I know your pool table is slate, so I say the table.

Billiard balls are heavy, like 2-3 pounds right? Way more than a phone (unless you're talking the first satellite phones).

Billiard balls are small, like about golf ball size. So even if they are dense, they don't way pounds. It's got to be close between a ball and a phone. I'd go with the ball, but not by much, and I might be wrong.

A typical 1,600 square foot house weighs in at 320,000 pounds, according to a building trades rule of thumb which estimates 200 pounds per square foot for single-level houses.

The 747-400, in use since 1985, weighs 400,000 pounds empty, and can get up to 900,000 loaded at take off.


The pool table weighs 1,150 pounds. About thirty pounds more than the Clippers starting five. But five average-weight NBA players would outweigh the table by about the same amount.

I should have specified that the billiard ball in question is for playing pool. There are billiard balls for other games which may be slightly smaller or slight heavier. But the answer wouldn't change.

The pool ball, which is 2.25 inches in diameter, weighs 5.9 ounces, while the iPhone 4S weighs 4.9 ounces. With the cover, the phone weighs exactly the same as the ball.

A. The hairs on your head, or US soldiers in Afghanistan?

B. All the books ever written, or the population of Brazil?

C. Pentagon budget, or Brazil's budget?

D. Distance to the sun, or payroll of the New York Knicks?

These are all just guesses.

The hairs on one's head (maybe not my head).

The population of Brazil.

The Pentagon Budget.

The last one is very close I think. NBA teams have a cap on their total salary, but a new deal last year with ESPN means that this year's salary cap is raised.
I'm going with the Knicks payroll.

Knicks = $56m, sun = 93m miles

Pentagon = ~700B, Brazil = 978B

Brazil = 200.4m, books = 130m

Hairs = 100,000, soldiers = 38,000

I guess in the future, I will make my guess and then write down the opposite.

It's fun to practice ball-parking. I read a book on it once, and it's surprising how few people can visualize a million dollars, or a thousand gallons.

A.  Words in the bible, or laws passed by Congress?

B.  Containers on a container ship, or ships in the US Navy?

C.  Donald Trump's net worth, or Switzerland's GDP?

D.  MPG on an Aventador or a Hummer?

E.  World's tallest building, or recommended skydiving altitude for zip lines?

All guesses. I will look them up later.

1. Laws passed by Congress. I'm basing this on the fact that they spend so much time naming buildings, etc..

2. Containers

3. Switzerland's GDP.

4. Can't answer this one. Which model Hummer? City or highway mileage?

5. I've never heard of skydiving from zip lines. Sounds stupid. Shouldn't be done. So, I'm going with the world's tallest building.

_Howard wrote:

5. I've never heard of skydiving from zip lines. Sounds stupid. Shouldn't be done. So, I'm going with the world's tallest building.

I had the wrong term. What do they call it when beginning skydivers get their ripcords pulled automatically as they exit the plane?

You're talking about a static line. That is not for skydivers. It's the standard exit method in military deployments, especially of of large units.

I'll stick with the building. I think static line jumps around 2,000 feet are realistic.

Okay.  Post what you find out about the answers, then post the next round.

By the way:
http://www.skydiving.co.uk/RAPS.htm
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tallest_buildings_and_structures_in_the_world

Standard model Hummer, not Hummer II or Hummer III whatever that Jeep model was. Compare both highway and city. Not necessary to compare top speeds.

I think the Aventador probably gives better mileage than the old military Hummers.

I provide my guesses; you provide the answers.