this post was submitted on 30 Oct 2025
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It's about 11.5 billion, really.
It's exactly 11.4 billion, really.
Well, if you want to get exact, sure. But if we're talking about half units, like 11 and a half billion, then 11.4 is so close to 11.5 there's no difference and calling it just about 11 sorta implies that it's a more significant difference IMO
You need to be as precise as your resolution, otherwise the precision is meaningless. I guess you could argue that your resolution is units of half-billion (since some things are measured like that), but the initial value of 0.1B, and your use of 0.5 rather than 'half' suggests a resolution of 0.1B.
This is different to the aphorism 'The difference between a million and a billion is about a billion', both because of the difference in scale, and the quoted resolution.
11.4 bln is 100 mln away from 11.5 bln. I'm not sure "so close" is correct here.
If a man worth 11.5 billion loses 100 million, it affects him less than you or I losing a thousand. In fact it doesn't affect him.
So you're a billionaire and one is not different from the other for you, gotcha.
59 seconds is 1000000000000 pico seconds away from a minute, so I'm not sure you could say 59 seconds is "so close" to a minute.
There are far more seconds in your life than hundreds of millions dollars.
And there are far more dollars in 11 billion than 100 million.