Tell me what comes after a trillion? What's the next -illion?

[Skidmore]

I heard someone on NPR today say this war will take a generation, just like the war with those dirty commies did before--and we can tough it out. How, I wonder, can we afford such an extravaganza? We are breaking under the burden of the trillion range of the world of numbers. What, I think, is the next level? Where do the neocons believe that a nation of customer service reps, food servers, and retail clerks can continue to underwrite this megawar? No disrepect to those who work the jobs I have mentioned, but when our infrastructure and manufacturing base have been so eroded and no effort is made invest in either, how the hell do they expect to fund this bloodbath?

[babylonsister]

1. Brazillion? Ba dum bum.

:hide:

[ashling]

17. Damn, beat me to it.

I just got on and saw this thread.

[mr_hat]

2. We'll bankrupt the terrorists with an arms race. No wait...

[JTG of the PRB]

3. Quadrillion?

That SHOULD be it, that is... billion, trillion, quadrillion = like bi-, tri-, quad- = two, three four...

[leftchick]

4. gazillion i think

:shrug:

[Critters2]

5. Quadrillion

Who would think you'd ever have need for the word "quadrillion"? Especially in reference to money...but the time seems to have arrived.

[scarletwoman]

6. Quadrillion is the next "illion" after trillion -- or maybe it's quatloos... (nt)

[Taverner]

11. Quadrillion, Quintillian, I don't know the next but Octillian...

[scarletwoman]

15. That would be sextillion (sounds fun!) & septillion, with nonillion following octillion.

However, long before that, everyone's head would explode, so it's all utterly non sequitor.

:D

[Taverner]

16. Aye - true that

[BlooInBloo]

19. Sext-, Sept-, Oct-, Nov-, Dec- (look familiar yet?).

[Scurrilous]

7. Table:

http://www.jimloy.com/math/billion.htm

[Skidmore]

12. "1000 billion," eh? I counted to 500 once when I was a kid. It took

a long chunk out of one of my summer days. I can't think this high numerically. I can't envision this in widgets, let alone monetary units. Not even one "1000 billion." And you know if this war isn't stopped it will be in multiples of "1000 billion."

[laruemtt]

8. quadrillion?

then quintillion, sextillion, septillion, octillion - don't know the rest - but i'm sure they're good and ready to put us into that much debt. :banghead:

[MLFerrell]

9. Large numbers above a billion are ordered with numerical prefixes.

TRIllion

QUADrillion

QUINTillion

SEXtillion

SEPtillion

OCTillion

NONillion

DECillion

After that, your guess is as good as mine.

[hyphenate]

10. It follows with Latin/Greek prefixes:

Quadrillion (Quad=4)
Quintillion (Quint=5)
Sextillion (Sext=6)
Septillion (Sept=7)
Octillion (Oct=8)

[roamer65]

13. Welcome to the world of fiat currencies.

The Federal Reserve can now conjure up any number of dollars they desire in this computer age. There are two ways to pay for wars, increased taxes or debasement of currency. We are going to do the latter, I hate to say.

A "One Quadrillion Dollars" note ought to have a real unique look to it, eh?

1,000,000,000,000,000. Right?

[BootinUp]

14. childs play

I liked Asimov's T number system. T-1 is a trillion to the trillionth power IIRC. T-8 atomic particles is more than exists in the entire known universe. lol.

[muriel_volestrangler]

18. You don't have to use that system - normal powers of 10 get you there easily

Back before its homophone was a search engine, a 'googol' was 10 to the power of a hundred. Wikipedia says: "Two back-of-envelope calculations give the number of atoms in the observable universe to be around ten to the power of eighty" - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Observable_universe .

If Asimov said T-8 is more than the particles in the universe, then I suspect T-1 is a trillion, T-2 is a trillion squared, T-3 a trillion cubed, etc. - ie 10 to the power of 12, 10 to the power of 24, etc. - T-8 would be 10 to the power of 96.