value of pi and 22/7
Steven D'Aprano
steve at pearwood.info
Fri Jun 17 21:19:23 EDT 2016
On Sat, 18 Jun 2016 09:49 am, Ian Kelly wrote:
> If I tell you that the speed of light is 300,000,000 m/s, do you think
> that measurement has 9 significant digits? If you do, then you would be
> wrong.
Hmmm.
If I tell you that some physical phenomenon [let's call it the speed of
light] is 299,999,999 m/s, how many significant digits would I be using?
What if I tell you that it's 300,000,001 m/s?
What if the figure to nine significant digits *actually is* three followed
by eight zeroes?
For all that it is in widespread use, I think the concept of "significant
figures" is inherently ambiguous.
--
Steven
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