The speed of light is truly an amazing, (that's an understatement!) thing.
Over the last hour or so, I've been having some fun with mathematical expressions dealing with the speed of light, and how far it travels in a second, minute, hour, day, week, month, year, decade, century, and in a millennium - both in miles, and in feet - written out in both scientific notation, and standard notation, to make it easier to visualize/understand!
So, without further ado, here is my work of art! I hope you like :
Speed of light measured in Miles per (X)
Code:
First, we figure out the speed of light in Miles/Second; which is 186,000 Miles/Second.
Next, we multiply this by 60 seconds, to get the distance traveled in a minute, and so on.
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186,000 Miles/Second x 60 Seconds = 11,160,000 Miles/Minute
11,160,000 Miles/Minute x 60 Minutes = 669,600,000 Miles/Hour
669,600,000 Miles/Hour x 24 Hours = 16,070,400,000 Miles/Day
16,070,400,000 Miles/Day x 7 Days = 112,492,800,000 Miles/Week
112,492,800,000 Miles/Week x 4 Weeks = 449,971,200,000 Miles/Month
449,971,200,000 Miles/Month x 12 Months = 5.399.6544e+12 Miles/Year
(5,399,654,400,000 Trillion Miles)
5.399.6544e+12 Miles/Year x 10 Years = 5.3996544e+13 Miles/Decade
(53,996,540,000,000 Trillion Miles)
5.3996544e+13 Miles/Decade x 10 Decades = 5.3996544e+14 Miles/Century
(539,965,400,000,000 Trillion Miles)
5.3996544e+14 Miles/Century x 10 Centuries = 5.3996544e+15 Miles/Millennium
(5,399,654,000,000,000 Quadrillion Miles)
Speed of light measured in Feet per (X)
Code:
First, we figure out how many feet are in a mile, which is 5,280 (~5,000) feet.
Next, we multiply the speed of light in Miles/Second, 186,000, by 5,000 feet.
Finally, we multiply that result by 60 seconds, to get the distance traveled in a minute, and so on.
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186,000 Miles/Second x 5,000 Feet = 930,000,000 Feet/Second
930,000,000 Feet/Second x 60 Seconds = 55,800,000,000 Feet/Minute
55,800,000,000 Feet/Minute x 60 Minutes = 3.348e+12 Feet/Hour
(3,348,000,000,000 Trillion Feet)
3.348e+12 Feet/Hour x 24 Hours = 8.0352e+13 Feet/Day
(80,352,000,000,000 Trillion Feet)
8.0352e+13 Feet/Day x 7 Days = 5.62464e+14 Feet/Week
(562,464,000,000,000 Trillion Feet)
5.62464e+14 Feet/Week x 4 Weeks = 2.249856e+15 Feet/Month
(2,249856,000,000,000 Quadrillion Feet)
2.249856e+15 Feet/Month x 12 Months = 2.6998272e+16 Feet/Year
(26,998,272,000,000,000 Quadrillion Feet)
2.6998272e+16 Feet/Year x 10 Years = 2.6998272e+17 Feet/Decade
(269,982,720,000,000,000 Quadrillion Feet)
2.6998272e+17 Feet/Decade x 10 Decades = 2.6998272e+18 Feet/Century
(2,699,827,200,000,000,000 Quintillion Feet)
2.6998272e+18 Feet/Century x 10 Centuries = 2.6998272e+19 Feet/Millennium
(26,998,272,000,000,000,000 Quintillion Feet
Now, if you want to figure out the distance light has traveled since the beginning of the Big Bang, all you have to do is multiply the result of the distance light travels in a year (In miles or feet, your choice) by the age of the universe (approximately 13 Billion years) I'm not going to do that for you though, I'll let you try it on your own!