The difference between 100 million and 11.5 billion is about 11 billion. If you own a bank 11 billion that’s not only that bank’s problem, it’s the economy’s problem.
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.
The difference between 100 million and 11.5 billion is about 11 billion. If you own a bank 11 billion that’s not only that bank’s problem, it’s the economy’s problem.
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.
I was referring to the general concept behind the quote.
I originally want to post the OG (apocryphal?) variant:
But it sounds rather quaint these days.