Return-Path: Received: by snark.thyrsus.com (/\==/\ Smail3.1.21.1 #21.19) id ; Wed, 12 Feb 92 06:54 EST Received: by cbmvax.cbm.commodore.com (5.57/UUCP-Project/Commodore 2/8/91) id AA23983; Wed, 12 Feb 92 06:29:49 EST Received: from cunixf.cc.columbia.edu by relay1.UU.NET with SMTP (5.61/UUNET-internet-primary) id AA03567; Wed, 12 Feb 92 05:49:28 -0500 Received: from cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu by cunixf.cc.columbia.edu (5.59/FCB) id AA27737; Wed, 12 Feb 92 05:48:14 EST Message-Id: <9202121048.AA27737@cunixf.cc.columbia.edu> Received: from CUVMB.COLUMBIA.EDU by CUVMB.COLUMBIA.EDU (IBM VM SMTP R1.2.1) with BSMTP id 3870; Wed, 12 Feb 92 05:45:14 EST Received: by CUVMB (Mailer R2.07) id 1239; Wed, 12 Feb 92 05:43:56 EST Date: Wed, 12 Feb 1992 10:41:16 GMT Reply-To: Ivan A Derzhanski Sender: Lojban list From: Ivan A Derzhanski Subject: Billions To: John Cowan , Eric Raymond , Eric Tiedemann In-Reply-To: Guy Steele's message of Tue, 11 Feb 1992 12:31:00 EST <13414.9202120010@cogsci.ed.ac.uk Status: RO X-From-Space-Date: Wed Feb 12 06:54:33 1992 X-From-Space-Address: cbmvax!uunet!CUVMA.BITNET!LOJBAN > Date: Tue, 11 Feb 1992 12:31:00 EST > From: Guy Steele > > I assure you that those who are buying memory chips and disk drives > for their computers are very interested in nanoseconds and gigabytes. > Terabytes and teraflops have become common terms of discussion over > the last few years as it becomes apparent that their implementation > will soon be a reality (indeed, terabyte tape backup was available > well over ten years ago). Laser impulses for fiber optics are best > measured in picoseconds, if not femtoseconds, and we are already > beginning to think about petabyte computer memories. What you say about seconds is true. But let's leave bytes alone. The prefixes have a different meaning when attached to them, the factor being 1024 rather than 1000. I'm not sure how Lojban should handle this fact. Ivan