Recently, I read that 10 million pounds of a certain edible product remained after a promotion was over at one of the food chains. While I wondered what they were going to be doing to "eat" the losses I also wondered what 10 million pounds looks like. I wondered what the number looked like laid out flat. In short tons it equals 5000. Well, now that has me wondering:
Does the word ton hold more power then pound?
Is it easier to conceptualize 10 million or 5000? Which one loses power and which would impact the reader?
Simply which is the stronger statistic?
The newspapers ran it as 10 million and when I looked up the tons conversion I was pretty shocked to find out it was only in the thousands. But I was looking for a BIG number, a bleak, hopeless, tiresome number that would leave me incapable to determine the size and thereby I would never render it. 5000 on the other hand I personally could interact with, it's an intimate number, a more personal one... now if only i could concisely show what a ton looks like.
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| First he lifts the horse, then he says I'm so hungry I could eat one! |
The average horse is just under 1000 pounds that's only half of a ton... is 10,000 horses a strong stat to you?
It's easy to say that both are frivolous, that is point of my choice of subject matter, but on the same page both aren't. Money is tight and food is still a commodity. There is a different emotional response between losing a twenty, fifty or hundred, versus losing a dollar bet or dropping a quarter under the fridge. Smashing a cake isn't as offensive as snatching dinner from a hungry mouth. But who doesn't want a little cake sometimes?
So what would upset you more? 5,000 ruined burnt up dollars, or 5,000 cookies slathered with a heaping coat of inedible liquid soap?
What if they weren't ruined but just all laid out? Do you know how much area they both cover? What does 5,000 of anything really look like? And what in the world are they going to do with 10 million pounds (5000 tons!) of food?
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