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What's the largest number you can come up with?

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Started by sooner123 July 28, 2011 03:06 PM

56 comments, last by guywithknife 12 years, 8 months ago

sooner123

269

Author

July 28, 2011 03:06 PM

Write/describe the largest finite number you possibly can in one post. You may use any amount of functions, numbers, or operations you know of or can come up with. As long as your number is unambiguously expressed, it counts. Please do not use any references (google/books/calculators/etc.) Just your noggin' if you please! Of course you can work stuff out on a piece of paper if you need, but I'd prefer to see what people come up with without consulting any references outside their brain.

Please post your response without reading any of the other replies in this thread

This is an interesting experiment I recently did with one of my classes and I'd love to see what people come up with here.

After this goes on for awhile, I'll post some of the more clever answers my students gave.

rip-off

11,000

July 28, 2011 03:18 PM



1 + ? 

      ? page : pages(http://www.gamedev.net/topic/607302-whats-the-largest-number-you-can-come-up-with) 

         ? post : posts(page) | post ? this

             eval(equation(post))

blog | twitter

SiCrane

11,840

July 28, 2011 03:20 PM

Well there's always calling the Ackermann function with Graham's number.

Ezbez

1,164

July 28, 2011 03:22 PM

rip-off: I think you will enjoy the equation in this post:

-1 times the Ackermann function of Graham's number.

(In other words, SiCrane is winning).

ChurchSkiz

1,101

July 28, 2011 03:31 PM

Does a googol count as unambiguous?

I would say googolplex^ googolplex

The_Neverending_Loop

635

July 28, 2011 03:33 PM

rip-off

11,000

July 28, 2011 04:12 PM

-1 times the Ackermann function of Graham's number.

Well played. I could add abs(), but I'm pretty sure I was cheating to start with.

blog | twitter

SiCrane

11,840

July 28, 2011 04:27 PM

1 + ? ? page : pages(http://www.gamedev.net/topic/607302-whats-the-largest-number-you-can-come-up-with) ? post : posts(page) | post ? this eval(equation(post))

Wouldn't you also be disqualified if someone quoted this formula since it would no longer be a finite number?

sooner123

269

Author

July 28, 2011 04:30 PM

[quote name='rip-off' timestamp='1311866335' post='4841642']
1 + ? ? page : pages(http://www.gamedev.net/topic/607302-whats-the-largest-number-you-can-come-up-with) ? post : posts(page) | post ? this eval(equation(post))

Wouldn't you also be disqualified if someone quoted this formula since it would no longer be a finite number?
[/quote]

Could pass the depth of recursion as an argument and terminate with a finite number at a certain depth.

But I was hoping for posts that didn't reference other posts