Making a Number From Space

[BlackJaw]

Hello, I'm new to the forum and I hope I'm not posting out of place or otherwise inappropriately.

I'm working on a bit of amatuer science fiction, and I need what is essentially a number representing something like a decade (13 years would be ideal), built symbolically from a mathmatical or scientific basis instead of using base terrestrial measurements like seconds/days/years/etc. The Voyager Record and it's play instructions in symbolic references is part of my inspiration for this.

 

For the base measurement of time I'm using the Crab Pulsar rotation, but I need to multiply it by larger values to make it about a decade in length instead of 33 milliseconds. I'd like to use Pi for story and theme reasons, but I still need a number somewhere around 1e+11, and I need it to be something broadly symbolic instead of an earth based number. It could of course be several values multiplied... but I'm not sure how to get those from my limited background. My preference would be towards numbers involved in advanced science or math, instead of a simple 1e+11 represented in binary. For example I'd love to use the speed of light in a vacuum, but it is measured in earth distances in earth time, which doesn't work.

So... I'm asking for help. Anyone have any ideas on how to get a nice big number?

[imatfaal]

I make it about 1e10 not 1e11 and cannot think of a nice number that would work. Number of observable galaxies in the observable universe has a range which will include your number - and that is dimensionless and thus non-anthropocentric

edit - might be neat to work in fact that crab pulsar is slowing down

or what about 11:11:11:11:11:11:11 in base 32 : it is a bit too small (a few percent)

[BlackJaw]

I make it about 1e10 not 1e11 and cannot think of a nice number that would work. Number of observable galaxies in the observable universe has a range which will include your number - and that is dimensionless and thus non-anthropocentric

 

I also noticed the math error later, but thank you for pointing it out. Also... "non-anthropocentric" is the word I was looking for earlier. Thank you!

 

I also ended up looking at the milkyway star count, and it's viable, but also a bit broad, having a range of 100 to 400 billion, which I could write around (having that number embeded in the signal too) but I'd still prefer something less vague if it can be worked out.

 

Right now, I've got this: Pi X Efficency of Hydrogen Fusion (.007) X Golden Ratio X larger end of the current Galactic Count (~348,000,000,000) = about 13 years as meassured in Crab Pulsar rotations. (Wolfram Alpha Link).

 

I also read something about the pulsar's having a slight slowing, but I thought it was so minor that it's wouldn't really matter. It'll slow down by about .15 seconds in 13 years if I did the math right, which won't effect my story concept at all... although you do note it might make a fun detail. Classic scientist trope of being overly spicific on the time range "give or take .15 seconds depending on if they acounted for spin down or not."

 

Thank you for the help so far. I'd still really love to find a non-anthropocentric replacement for the number of stars in the galaxy. I'd still be fine with a handful of other numbers in it's place. I'm realizing that ratios work well, as do atomic counts.

 

I've been considering for vaibility:

• Atomic number of lead 82 (the largest atomic number for a stable element.)
• 145,000, the ratio of the size of a hydrogen atom to the size of it's nucleus
• The temperature of the cosmic background radiation in Planck Temperature (3.861×10^32) (I think planck temperature is non-anthropocentric, and that the cosmic background radiation temperature falls in a small enough band that it coud work as a number) It's sadly too large a number.