[plug] billion (was Unix Epoch: 1 billion seconds breakfast function.)

[John Knight]

I was using the Heinemann (I don't know if I've spelled that correctly) 
Australian Dictionary, an Australian Oxford School Dictionary and the odd 
Oxford set from here and there.


>
>On Mon, Sep 03, 2001 at 11:51:33AM +0800, John Knight wrote:
> > Time for my usual rant of pedantry, but would this be an English or an
> > American billion? I've always been quite puzzled by this as according to
> > the dictionary, a billion is 10 to the power of 12 (a million millions)
>   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>See below...
>
> > unless you live in America or France where it is 10 to the power of 9 (a
> > thousand millions).
> >
> > Why does everyone use the US billion even if modern dictionaries say 
>that
>                                                ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>Which dictionaries? Published where? "Defining" which variant of English?
>
>A copy of "Collins English Dictionary, Updated Third Edition (1995) (an
>extensive coverage of contemporary international and Australian English)"
>here at work gives the following:
>
>billion  n.
>1. one thousand million: written as 1 000 000 000 or 10^9.
>2. (formerly, in Britian) one million million (10^12).
>3. (often pl.) any exceptionally large number.
>[ ... some other less interesting bits ]
>
> > it's 10 to the power of 12? I'm not trying to point out an error, this
> > has simply been puzzling me for years.
>
>My understanding of it is that simply Australia (and probably most of the
>rest of the English-speaking world) had officially adopted the so-called
>"US" meaning of billion rather than the English/British meaning quite a
>while ago.
>
>You'd have to consult a professional pedant to find out precisly when. :)
>
>Pete.
>--
>http://akira.apana.org.au/~pete/
>
>--
>A debugged program is one for which you have not yet found the conditions
>that make it fail.
>		-- Jerry Ogdin
>


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