One billion billions = one Sagan?

Sounds like you only looked at part of the naming system. If you’re thinking of the prefix as showing how many groups of three zeros, then million is two (in the U.S.), not one, and billion is three.

The Brits, on the other hand, are counting blocks of six zeros. Million is one, billion is two, trillion is three…

Sure, here you go…



# of 0s   American Name       British Name
-------   ------------------  --------------------
3         thousand            thousand
6         million             million
9         billion             milliard
12        trillion            billion
15        quadrillion         thousand billion
18        quintillion         trillion
21        sextillion          thousand trillion
24        septillion          quadrillion
27        octillion           thousand quadrillion
30        nonillion           quintillion
33        decillion           thousand quintillion
36        undecillion         sextillion
39        duodecillion        thousand sextillion
42        tredecillion        septillion
45        quattuordecillion   thousand septillion
48        quindecillion       octillion
51        sexdecillion        thousand octillion
54        septendecillion     nonillion  
57        octodecillion       thousand nonillion
60        novemdecillion      decillion 
63        vigintillion        thousand decillion
100       googol              googol
303       centillion        
600                           centillion
1 googol  googolplex 	      googolplex


For about the billionth time, British billions are the same as US billions, 10[sup]9[/sup]. True, decades ago the word did mean 10[sup]12[/sup] here, but that usage is obsolete. Whether we ever used “milliard”, I’m not old enough to know.

Sweet, thank you. Obviously there had to be a nice logical reason for the naming, and it was clearly beyond me to suss out. Thanks again.

I believe that the idea of a billion billion = a sagan came from this list

(or another of the many variations on it which have been making the rounds) which includes such gems as:

2.4 statute miles of surgical tubing at Yale U. = 1 I.V.League
2000 pounds of chinese soup = 1 Won Ton
16.5 feet in the Twilight Zone = 1 Rod Serling
:smiley: