Re: Accuracy and Precision
- To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
- Subject: [mg37059] Re: Accuracy and Precision
- From: pkosta2002 at yahoo.com (Peter Kosta)
- Date: Mon, 7 Oct 2002 05:26:18 -0400 (EDT)
- References: <anggkb$prg$1@smc.vnet.net> <anorfo$poq$1@smc.vnet.net>
- Sender: owner-wri-mathgroup at wolfram.com
pkosta2002 at yahoo.com (Peter Kosta) wrote in message news:<anorfo$poq$1 at smc.vnet.net>...
> The more I play with the example the more depressing it gets. Start
> with floating point numbers but explicitely arbitrary-precision ones.
>
> In[1]:=
> a=77617.00000000000000000000000000000;
> b=33095.00000000000000000000000000000;
>
> In[3]:=
> \!\(333.7500000000000000000000000000000\ b\^6 + a\^2\ \((11\ a\^2\
> b\^2 - \
> b\^6 - 121\ b\^4 - 2)\) + 5.500000000000000000000000000000\ b\^8 +
> a\/\(2\
> b\)\)
>
> Out[3]=
> \!\(\(-4.78339168666055402578083604864320577443814`26.6715*^32\)\)
>
> In[4]:=
> Accuracy[%]
>
> Out[4]=
> -6
>
> Due to the manual section 3.1.6:
>
> "When you do calculations with arbitrary-precision numbers, as
> discussed in the previous section, Mathematica always keeps track of
> the precision of your results, and gives only those digits which are
> known to be correct, given the precision of your input. When you do
> calculations with machine-precision numbers, however, Mathematica
> always gives you a machineprecision result, whether or not all the
> digits in the result can, in fact, be determined to be correct on the
> basis of your input. "
>
> Because I started with arbitrary-precision numbers Mathematica should display
> only those digits that are correct, that is none.
I retract the above comment. I did not notice that was an error in the input.
b=33095.00000000000000000000000000000
intstead of intended
b=33096.00000000000000000000000000000
I am sorry for the mistake.
PK
>
>
> To relax a bit, set a new input cell to StandardForm and type
> 77617.000000000000000000000000000000000
>
> Convert it to InputForm. You get
> 77616.999999999999999999999999999999999999999999952771`37.9031
>
> Convert back to StandardForm
> 77616.99999999999999999999999999999999999999999976637`37.9031
>
> Again to InputForm
> 77616.99999999999999999999999999999999999999999963735`37.9031
>
> Back to StandardForm
> 77616.99999999999999999999999999999999999999999951376`37.9031
>
> See what you can get if you have enough patience or a small program.
>
> PK