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WonderScience fact

There are more possible ways to shuffle a deck of 52 cards than there are atoms on Earth.

Mathematics

Science

The story behind the card

The count is a factorial, written 52!: multiply 52 by 51, then by 50, and so on all the way down to 1. The result has 68 digits, roughly 8 followed by 67 zeros. Earth contains about 10 to the power of 50 atoms, 1 followed by 50 zeros. So a thoroughly shuffled deck is almost certainly in an order no deck has ever been in before. Even if everyone alive shuffled a deck every second for billions of years, they would try only a vanishing fraction of the possible orders.

Türkçe oku
52 kartlık bir deste, Dünya'daki atom sayısından daha fazla farklı sırayla dizilebilir.

Bu sayı bir faktöriyeldir ve 52! diye yazılır: 52'yi 51 ile, sonra 50 ile çarpar, böyle 1'e kadar inersiniz. Sonuç 68 basamaklı bir sayıdır; kabaca 8'in ardına 67 sıfır eklenmiş hâli. Dünya'daki atomların sayısı ise yaklaşık 1'in ardına 50 sıfır koyarak bulunur. Bu yüzden iyice karılmış bir deste, büyük olasılıkla daha önce hiçbir destenin almadığı bir sıradadır. Yeryüzündeki herkes milyarlarca yıl boyunca her saniye bir deste karsa bile, olası dizilişlerin ancak devede kulak kadarını deneyebilirdi.

Sources and further reading

Background reading: Factorial
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