How big is the biggest number?

[Square Wheels]

?

[Zephyr]

N + 1

[Bikeguy]

Apparently 72 is the biggest.

[Kzoo]

32 minutes ago, Bikeguy said:

Apparently 72 is the biggest.

So why didn’t our exalted ruler already know this?

[maddmaxx ★]

Bigger than that.  Beyond the end of the internet even.  No, you can't see it from here.

[Zealot]

About this big:

[Square Wheels]

3 hours ago, Zealot said:

About this big:

plus 1

[Zealot]

12 minutes ago, Square Wheels said:

plus 1

[Thaddeus Kosciuszko]

20 hours ago, Square Wheels said:

How big is the biggest number?

 

It's one less than the tax bill you'll get from Massachusetts, now that you've moved out.

 

[Dottleshead ★]

It's not bound. 

[Longjohn ★]

 

[MickinMD ★]

It depends on if "things are many" or "things are one" as the Greek philosophers argued over 2500 years ago.

The great Zeno of Elea composed "The Paradoxes of Zeno" to prove things are NOT many."

One paradox is that, if things are many, we can NOT walk from where we are to a doorway.

The reason is, we have to walk halfway there first.  Then we have to walk halfway of what's left.  Etc. Etc. Etc. and you never run out of halfway's you have to cross.

But we can make it to the doorway, so things are NOT many!  Those in Zeno's camp were called "The Atomists" because they believed that if, for example, you cut a piece of wood in half, in half again, and so on, eventually you would get something that is not wood: atoms.

Just are matter exists in discrete units, physical things like length and size have to be thought of in discrete units.

So there is no such "thing" as being infinitely small or infinitely large.

In modern terms, we would say there is not an infinite number of points on a line segment between two physical places - there is a smallest "quanta" distance.

So, the biggest and smallest numbers are not known, but they're not infinite.