Comprehending Very Large Numbers

Our number system has also constructed a number naming system with which number of almost any magnitude can be given a name. Today we have words like million, trillion, quadrillion etc to refer to these numbers. This was always not so.

We have seen that the Romans did not need a numeral more than "myriad" which is equal to ten thousand.

But the Vedas & the Indian epics had concepts of very large numbers to indicate the age of the universe and that of Gods. But their system was oral and not written down. May be it was logical that the decimal place value system originated in India.

But psychologists & neuroscientists have confirmed that the human ability to make sense of numerosity of numbers is very limited. They have postulated a "numerosity centre" in the brain which helps us understand numerosity.

A lack of development of this numerosity centre possibly results in the condition of Dyscalculia. We also understand that the skill of "number sense" needs to be specifically developed in children from pre-school onwards.

One reason for this is that for evolutionary survival, sensing numerosity was not as important as sensing "magnitude". We have seen this in an earlier chapter on the Math & the Mind.

Today, our science & technology have developed enough to need very large & very small numbers to describe events in our universe.

But our ability to comprehend such numbers is very limited. We use millions & billions very easily, without understanding the difference between them. We need examples from our lives to even comprehend them.

Like - if you were to spend $1 million an hour, non-stop for 24 hours a day, it would take you 114 years to burn through $1 trillion!

Like - If you travelled back in time by a trillion seconds, you would end up circa 30,000 BC.

Without such "close to life" examples, very large numbers would just be "very large numbers".