The Great Pea Analogy

And you

100 peas (1x102)

• How much volume do you think 100 average size peas would take up?

• They would occupy approximately one cubic inch.

• (Although personally, I think you may need to mush them together to make them fit)

One Million peas(1 x 106)

• How much volume do you think a million peas would occupy?

The volume of a refrigerator

What about a Billion peas?(1 x 109)

• Approximately the volume of an average house (do not try this at home)

A Whole House????

• Yes an entire house from the basement to the attic full of peas

What about a trillion peas?(1 x 1012)

• About 1000 houses (the size of a medium size town.

• But are we even close to a mole of peas?

• Oh no – not even close!

Alright then, what about a quadrillion peas (1 x 1015)

• That is a lot of peas!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

• Enough to fill all the buildings in Mississauga!

Are we close to a mole yet?

•NO

•Not yet

OK what about a quintillion peas(1 x 1018)

• Well that would be enough peas to cover the entire province of Ontario with peas nearly 4 feet deep!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

• But still not even close to a mole of peas

• I am sorry I could not find a photo of Ontario covered in 4 feet of peas

Something like this…

What about a Sextillion peas?(1 x 1021)

• Yes this is a real number!

• This would be enough peas to cover all the continents of the world with peas 4 feet deep. Imagine North America, Africa, South America, Europe, Australia, Asia, all covered with 4 feet of peas!!!!!!!

• Still not close to a mole of peas

.

Well how much room would a mole of peas take up then?

• Imagine 250 planets the size of the Earth completely covered with 4 feet of peas.

• This would be a mole of peas

• Give or take a few peas of course

• How many peas would I have if they were the same as the number of atoms in my body???????????????????????????

• A cotillion peas (1 x 1027)

That blanket of peas

• Would be 4 feet deep

• And cover 250,000 planets the size of earth!!!!!!!!!!

• Wow a mole is a really big number then.

• So everything that contains a mole of atoms must be really big right????

NO

• Because atoms are very small!