Humans are very good at generating very large numbers, but we are perhaps surprisingly terrible at visualizing the large numbers we create. As soon as they get out of our relative imagination, where we can connect the number to something we know, we just don't have the intuition to see them anymore.
For example, we hear about someone winning $5 million in the lottery, and that is still in the scope of our understanding, because we can think that a nice house might be a million, so it is five houses worth. Or, 20 Ferraris, or more money than most of us would make in an entire lifetime of earning the average salary.
But, watch the news and hear about a 5 billion being spent on a weapons system, and we see it in a similar way to the lottery win. Or, we hear about an increase in the national debt of 5 trillion over the space of a few years, and it seems acceptable, and manageable. This is because we just don't understand these numbers, we can no longer humanly comprehend what this types of figures mean, because we have no idea what is possible with it.
A friend of mine referenced a conversation we had had a few years ago where I was talking to him about our large number shortcomings. He sent me a Tweet that highlighted the difference between a million seconds, and a billion seconds. Below, I added the trillion seconds also - just to see how our intuition works.
One million seconds would take up 11 days, 13 hours 46 minutes and 40 seconds
One billion seconds is 31 years and 8 months
One trillion seconds is slightly over 31,688 years
Now, while you can do the calculations, does your visual skills really build a solid understanding of what the differences between those time frames is? The first one, sure - 11 days - I can understand that. Even the second one with 31 years, which is two full thirds of my life - I can kind of grasp. A trillion?
Nope.
What about in monetary terms?
5 million dollars = 5 nice homes.
5 billion dollars = 5000 nice homes.
5 trillion dollars = 5,000,000 nice homes.
Remember, there is a housing crisis in many parts of the world, including the US, with house prices at an ATH, while salaries are not keeping up with inflation. Many people just can't afford to get into a house now.
In the last three years, the US national debt has grown by around 5,000,000, million-dollar homes.
Or,
15,000,000 average homes.
Here's another way to visualize some of this debt:
Because we don't have the intuition for these very large numbers, the don't seem very large at all. So, while they get thrown around in the media, we end up fixating on what we can visualize, the smalltime amounts - the chickenfeed, while enormous volumes fly under the radar, unseen by the majority. It is like smuggling an elephant under a baby's blanket, and no one noticing.
There is no way around our inability, other than by making ourselves aware that we aren't good at comprehending these large numbers. When we hear them, we should translate them immediately into something we can understand, some kind of heuristic that gives a decent representation, so we don't have the wool pulled over our eyes. There might not be much we can do about it, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't know about it.
I was talking to my daughter about this a bit tonight, but it is clear that she hasn't the concept of even the pretty large numbers yet, because she hasn't the experience with them. But, she did get the sense of scale with the visualization of time, where a million seconds was understandable, but she lost all sense at a billion, as it is 5x as long as she has lived so far. In time, she will get more of a grasp on it, and it isn't important now.
For adults though, we should know better than to trust our intuition, because it is based on our experience. When we have no real experience with something, our intuition is just guessing, and making us feel right, no matter if we are correct or not.
A million dollars is not what it used to be - but a billion is still a hell of a lot.
Taraz
[ Gen1: Hive ]
Posted Using InLeo Alpha
Grasping number visually require specific training. If you work with graphs and pie charts, that help as a mental representation.
This is a good point. Graphs help with understanding the scale to some degree - but not necessarily the impact of what those numbers mean. It is a good start though and I do try to create visuals for Smallsteps :)
This is just the situation in my country today. Owing a house has become a dream. Our salary is just enough for our basic needs and it everyday decreases against constant inflation.
Things aren't worth more, money is worth less.
Your example of using seconds to illustrate the size difference between a million, a billion and a trillion is, in my books, an extremely effective one. I’d never stopped to contemplate just how large a trillion would be in this unit of measurement, and as I was reading my mind was already estimating 100’s or 1000’s of years, but to see 10’s of thousands of years was impressive. Daunting? Immense, maybe. And then to extrapolate that by multiplying it by the US debt, well that makes for a real mind-boggling number of years.
A real interesting read. Thanks for posting this. It’s a topic I don’t often consider but really should spend more time thinking about because it really does effect us all.
I always find it interesting at how wrong our intuitions can be, where even like a straight-line calculation like this, it just doesn't compute. I figure the trick is that we have to be able to relate these numbers to something realistic in our personal experience, and most of us have no experience with billions and trillions.
I think that’s true of everything new we come across, not just large numbers. Many people who speak publicly, pastors, self-help folk, etc, have a swag of illustrative points they use to help convey their ideas easier.
Even as a teacher, I took on a Year 7 Maths class, and needing to be able to explain concepts (because, for some reason, everything in Year 7 Maths was new to most students) in different ways was so important in helping students to understand and grasp what they were hearing. Often, the best way to help them visualise something was to put it into a context for their life so that they could relate to it more than the words in the textbook.
I donno those numbers look pretty big to me. But I think I also have the opposite problem and at that scale might be visualising them bigger than they are, probably unrealistically so a lot of the time XD
They look big - but they are immense! :D
I wish my wife had this problem.
...we are still talking about numbers right? RIGHT?!
The debt going up is definitely concerning and worst yet, Congress doesn't seem to care how much they spend. It makes me wonder because it just looks like assets are the way to go.
All of that added debt will flow to the richest, who will transfer it into assets, right? Ownership is the way to go for sure.
This is exactly the way it looks. And after they do that, they come to tell the citizens that there’s no money in the treasury to build more infrastructure that could help enhance citizens livelihood. But they always find it easy to throw billions and trillions around for wars.
It’s easy to smuggle elephant with politics.
No one seems to question where all this debt is being spent.
Those who can, are those who reap the rewards, so they tend/prefer to look the other way. While the citizens on the other hand, have to turn the other cheek, and keep paying their taxes without asking questions.
I remember reading in one media how a regular person will have difficulty in spending 500 million dollars in a short amount of time. It is mind blowing how the really rich can do that in less than a week. We are living in different worlds from them.
Yep. There are the 99.9% and then the rest who play by their own rules, making more rules as they go.
Dear my bro @tarazkp !
In the world where I live, many people argue that the European euro is doomed.
So, They claim that the US dollar is the safest asset. What do you think?
I don't think so. I think all of the fiat currencies are ultimately doomed.
Are you investing in cryptocurrency because you think all fiat currencies in the world will perish?
There are so many people who can no longer meet up with their needs. Their salary is just enough for the basic things they need and that’s all
The economic situation of my country is worst!
Damn right we are just capable of fulfilling our basic needs and our dreams are just lock in box that's too harsh situation
I am amazed how adding a few zeros can increase your buying power. I only wish it would be easy to add multiply income that easily.
If you can't see this awesome banner, open this post InLeo
Forget that stinking fiat.
1 BTC = 1 BTC