Comment on Say hello to Bary

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dmention7@midwest.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

Sure, I totally agree that when you’re dealing many with orders of magnitude, the factor of 3 is dwarved by the other uncertainties.

But we’re talking about our solar system, and specifically the orbital mechanics of our planets and sun, where the quantities and scales only span a couple orders of magnitude in total. A factor of 3 absolutely makes a difference. That’s the difference between the orbit of Mercury and the orbit of Earth.

Then there’s the practical point that, regardless of scale, rounding a known constant by that much makes no sense at all, unless you’re trying to estimate huge numbers in your head. If you’re using even the simplest of calculator, estimating pi as 1 is a deliberate choice to reduce accuracy.

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