When Is A Billion Not A Billion
In a discussion on a writers' board, there was what I thought would be a brief discussion about what to call 5,400,000,000. Five point four billion, right?
As it turns out, not necessarily. and the explanation is not only fascinating, but it explains something about the BBC - more on that in a moment. First we must return to the 15th and 16th centuries, during which French mathematicians developed the terms billion and trillion - which meant 1012 and 1018 respectively.
But for some reason, a century later, some scientists in Italy and France started using billion to mean 109, or a 1 followed by nine zeros. That created what eventually come to be called the long and short scales. In the former system, there was a name every time you added an additional six zeros - or multipled by a million - and in the latter, the new names started with every three additional zeros, or multiplication by a thousand.
The world was now split, with many countries, including Britain using the long form, and some using the short. By the 18th century, the short use appears in the British colonies in North American, although back in England the citizens still used the long scale. By the early 19th century, the U.S. officially converted to the short scale and taught it in schools, as did most people in France. Britain remained unmoved.
By the 20th century, things got really screwy. The French now officially proclaimed the long scale to be the one to use, and by 1994, the Italians also embraced the long scale. Note that these were the very two countries that had started all the confusion in the first place. In 1974, the United Kingdom had official statistics switch to the short scale. I'm sure it had something to do with the French moving back to the long scale. And you thought geopolitics was confusing.
As for the BBC, there is still some use of the long scale, which is why news presenters will still often say "thousand million" rather than billion. How quaint - though I'm not sure which side is.
As it turns out, not necessarily. and the explanation is not only fascinating, but it explains something about the BBC - more on that in a moment. First we must return to the 15th and 16th centuries, during which French mathematicians developed the terms billion and trillion - which meant 1012 and 1018 respectively.
But for some reason, a century later, some scientists in Italy and France started using billion to mean 109, or a 1 followed by nine zeros. That created what eventually come to be called the long and short scales. In the former system, there was a name every time you added an additional six zeros - or multipled by a million - and in the latter, the new names started with every three additional zeros, or multiplication by a thousand.
The world was now split, with many countries, including Britain using the long form, and some using the short. By the 18th century, the short use appears in the British colonies in North American, although back in England the citizens still used the long scale. By the early 19th century, the U.S. officially converted to the short scale and taught it in schools, as did most people in France. Britain remained unmoved.
By the 20th century, things got really screwy. The French now officially proclaimed the long scale to be the one to use, and by 1994, the Italians also embraced the long scale. Note that these were the very two countries that had started all the confusion in the first place. In 1974, the United Kingdom had official statistics switch to the short scale. I'm sure it had something to do with the French moving back to the long scale. And you thought geopolitics was confusing.
As for the BBC, there is still some use of the long scale, which is why news presenters will still often say "thousand million" rather than billion. How quaint - though I'm not sure which side is.
posted by Erik Sherman @ 6:57 AM
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