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I don't use this site as a blogging site. In fact, I never have time to blog. It's funny because I work with other people and help them to blog. I build blogs for people (WordPress rocks!). I read blogs. I've inspired other people to start blogging. Yet, I never have the chance to do it. Here's my chance. Blog blog blog. You see? I have no idea what to say. So many people that have started blogs have things to say. I do things, I make things, but I have a hard time writing about it all.
I just needed to get that off my chest. Blame it on the Nyquil. But who knows... maybe I'll just start blabbing away on this thing. Make it my stream of consciousness dumping bin for all the crud inside my head. I need to make more room in there anyway. Wouldn't it be cool to pull out your thoughts like the wizards do in Harry Potter? Thin, silvery threads of thoughts all stashed in a pensieve ready to be activated upon when needed. I do wonder how we hold so much information in our brains - just think of all the numbers you've got in there. Social Security number, phone numbers, addresses, birthdates... There's an infinite amount of bytage in our brains - more than a brontobyte, I'm sure. And that's a real number. Check out this chart from the Ask a Storage Expert dude:
- 1000 Bytes = 1 Kilobyte
- 1000 Kilobytes = 1 Megabyte
- 1000 Megabytes = 1 Gigabyte
- 1000 Gigabytes = 1 Terabyte
- 1000 Terabytes = 1 Petabyte
- 1000 Petabytes = 1 Exabyte - In 2000, 3 exabytes of
information was created
- 1000 Exabytes = 1 Zettabyte
- 1000 Zettabyte = 1 Zottabyte
- 1000 Zottabyte = 1 Brontobyte - that is a 1 followed by
27 zeroes
I had never heard of anything past terabyte and I can barely imagine how much space that takes up but it would look like this on paper - 1000000000000000000000000000. How did someone discover this? It boggles the mind. So I thought I would take this question up with the great, almighty GOOGLE. I asked, "how much memory capacity does the brain have?" And can you believe it? There's an answer thanks to WikiAnswer:
"The human brain contains about 50 billion to 200 billion neurons
(nobody knows how many for sure), each of which interfaces with 1,000
to 100,000 other neurons through 100 trillion (10 14) to 10
quadrillion (10 16) synaptic junctions. Each synapse possesses a
variable firing threshold which is reduced as the neuron is repeatedly
activated. If we assume that the firing threshold at each synapse can
assume 256 distinguishable levels, and if we suppose that there are
20,000 shared synapses per neuron (10,000 per neuron), then the total
information storage capacity of the synapses in the cortex would be of
the order of 500 to 1,000 terabytes. (Of course, if the brain's
storage of information takes place at a molecular level, then I would
be afraid to hazard a guess regarding how many bytes can be stored in
the brain. One estimate has placed it at about 3.6 X 10 19 bytes.)"
The quote is attributed to "some researchers," meaning the 12 year old kid next door who's been trying to find his way to the moon and came upon the ultimate equation to figure out brain capacity. I suppose, according to the "researcher," the formula would equal a petabyte. I think.
But my favorite answer so far is from Ace Pincter on the Answer Bag. "1 gigglebite," they wrote. It made me smile.
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