The Planck length ruler!

Why bother with plain old inches or centimeters, when you can measure things in a unit based on the fundamental constants of the universe!

I'd like to refer to these tick marks using ginormous metric prefixes, like how you'd say that the universe is 430 petaseconds (Ps) old. Unfortunately, the largest metric prefix, yotta (Y), is only 10²⁴, and this ruler shows much larger aggregates of Planck lengths than this. My only alternative is to string together two metric prefixes, with the understanding that they'll multiply together, e.g. kiloyotta would be a thousand yotta, or 10²⁷, and megayotta would be a million yotta or 10³⁰.

So ... the big tick marks on the ruler are gigayottaPlanck-lengths (GYl_P). The little tick marks would be increments of 100 megayottaPlanck-lengths (100 MYl_P). For comparison, a football field is a little over five terayottaPlanck-lengths (TYl_P) long.

Coming soon:

• The Planck time wall clock and wristwatch!
  • Good heavens, the day is 1.068 x 10⁴⁸ t_P old already? Time for tea.
• The Planck mass bathroom scale!
  • Uh oh, I think I had one too many large pizzas. I'm up to 4.585 gigaPlanck-masses. At my height of 113.2 gigayottaPlanck-lengths, that's a body mass index of 29.8. I'd better cut back on the cheesecake!
• The Planck force bathroom scale!
  • Because telling people you're 4.585 x 10⁹ m_P just doesn't have the same zing as telling 'em you weigh 8.09 x 10^-42 F_P.
• The Planck temperature thermostat and meat thermometer!
  • For homemade crescent rolls, heat oven to 3.17468 x 10^-30 T_P.
• The Planck pressure tire gauge!
  • Good! The ol' bicycle tires are pumped up to 8.93 x 10^-109 p_P. Time for a nice brisk 4.979 x 10³⁸ l_P bike ride before breakfast!
• Planck volume measuring cups and spoons!
  • ... add 1.12 x 10¹⁰¹ l_P³ sifted all-purpose flour, 5.6 x 10¹⁰⁰ l_P³ sugar, and 1.17 x 10⁹⁹ l_P³ salt.
• The fraction-of-c speedometer!
  • Sir, the posted speed limit on California's urban freeways is 96.9 nano-c. If you don't slow down, I shall have to write you a ticket for being too short and massive!
• The Planck voltage voltage meter!

Go back to my main page for more wondrous outpourings of my personal, ahem, creativity.

Send comments regarding this Web page to: Roger M. Wilcox.