Can you solve it? Bigger! Faster! Heavier! – quiz

T-Rex Photograph: Eye Risk/Alamy

Hi guzzlers

We use numbers every day to describe the world – distances, weights, speeds, debts, populations, and so on. Yet most of us struggle to have an intuitive sense of what these numbers mean. How big is big? How fast is fast?

Today I’ve set a different challenge to my usual mathematical puzzle. The 10 questions below are a test of estimation skills, common sense and general knowledge – but also of our feel for numbers.

Often the best way to get a deeper sense of a what a number means is to make meaningful comparisons. Or even quite random comparisons. Let’s start with a big number from Wimbledon, which starts today.

1. 

   Which of these is the most numerous?

   1. Games played in longest-ever tennis match (Isner v Mahut at Wimbledon 2010)

   2. Number of aircraft carriers that have been constructed

   3. Number of buildings in New York City higher than 150 metres

   4. Number of bones in the human body

2. 

   Which of these is the biggest?

   1. Length of a London bus

   2. Estimated length of Tyrannosaurus rex

   3. Distance a kangaroo can jump

   4. Width of a football goal

3. 

   Which of these has the greatest mass?

   1. An Airbus A380 airliner (maximum takeoff weight)

   2. The Statue of Liberty

   3. A combat-ready Challenger 2 tank – the British Army’s main battle tank

   4. The International Space Station

4. 

   Which of these is the smallest?

   1. A light year

   2. Distance from the sun to Neptune

   3. Length (circumference) of Earth's orbit around the sun

   4. Halley's comet's closest distance from the sun (perihelion)

5. 

   Which of these is the fastest?

   1. Fastest speed attained by a human-powered aircraft

   2. Top speed of a giraffe

   3. Fastest speed attained by a human-powered watercraft

   4. Top speed of a great white shark

6. 

   Which of these is the most numerous?

   1. The population of Chongqing, China

   2. The population of Austria (2017)

   3. Estimated world population of blue duiker antelope

   4. Number of articles in Wikipedia (as of 22 June 2018)

7. 

   Which of these is the smallest?

   1. Height of the Leaning Tower of Pisa

   2. Height of the US Presidents' heads carved into Mount Rushmore

   3. Height of Beachy Head cliff on the south coast of England

   4. Height of the Elizabeth Tower (home to Big Ben) in London

8. 

   Which of these is the shortest vertical distance?

   1. Highest ascent by a hot air balloon (2004)

   2. Depth of the deepest part of the ocean, the Mariana trench

   3. Height of Mount Everest

   4. Depth of the deepest mine in the world – Mponeng gold mine in South Africa

9. 

   Which of these has the smallest population?

   1. Estonia

   2. The Gaza Strip

   3. Jamaica

   4. Luxembourg

10. 

    Which of these is the greatest distance?

    1. Distance from London to New York

    2. Length of the Nile river

    3. Length of the US/Canada border

    4. Length of the Chile/Argentina border

Solutions

1:C - 257 buildings, followed by 206 bones, followed by 183 games in Isner v Mahut, followed by 146 aircraft carriers (of which only 20 now in service)., 2:C - 13.5 metres, followed by the T rex at 12.3 metres, the London bus at 11.23 metres, and the width of a goal at 7.32 metres, 3:A - 575,000kg, followed by the International Space Station at 420,000kg, followed by Liberty at 201,400kg, followed by the tank at 62,500kg, 4:D - 87.7m km, followed by Earth’s orbit at 940m km, followed by Sun to Neptune at 4.5bn km, followed by a light year at 9.46trn km, 5:B - Go giraffes! 52 km/h, followed by the aircraft at 44.3 km/h, followed by the shark at 40km/h, followed by the watercraft at 34.3 km/h, 6:B - 8.75m, followed by Chongqing at 8.19m, followed by the blue duikers at 7m, followed by Wikipedia at 5.66m, 7:B - 18 metres, followed by the Tower of Pisa at 57 metres, followed by Big Ben at 96 metres, followed by Beachy Head at 162 metres, 8:D - 3.9km, followed by the balloon at 6.61km, followed by Everest at 8.85km, followed by the Mariana Trench at 10.99km, 9:D - 594,100, followed by Estonia at 1.252 million, followed by the Gaza strip at 1.795 million, followed by Jamaica at 2.78 million, 10:C - 8,890km, followed by the Nile at 6,850km, followed by London-New York at 5,580km, followed by Chile/Argentina at 5,150km

Scores

1. 10 and above.

   Well done! Be honest now, did you Google? Those were pretty tricky. No? Can I be on your team in the next pub quiz?

2. 9 and above.

   Well done! Be honest now, did you Google? Those were pretty tricky. No? Can I be on your team in the next pub quiz?

3. 8 and above.

   Well done! Some of those were pretty tricky, heh?

4. 7 and above.

   Well done! Some of those were pretty tricky, heh?

5. 6 and above.

   Not bad at all, but I bet you could do better if you read the Guardian a bit more often and improved your general knowledge.

6. 5 and above.

   Not bad, but I bet you could do better if you read the Guardian a bit more often and improved your general knowledge.

7. 4 and above.

   Not bad, but I bet you could do better if you read the Guardian a bit more often and improved your general knowledge.

8. 2 and above.

   Ahem. Were you paying attention at all in school? You've got some catching up to do! Try logging in to the Guardian more often to improve your general knowledge.

9. 3 and above.

   Could do better. Try logging in to the Guardian more often to improve your general knowledge.

10. 0 and above.

    Ahem. Were you paying attention at all in school? You've got some catching up to do! Try logging in to the Guardian more often to improve your general knowledge.

11. 1 and above.

    Ahem. Were you paying attention at all in school? You've got some catching up to do! Try logging in to the Guardian more often to improve your general knowledge.

The examples in these questions were chosen by Andrew C A Elliott, who runs IsThatABigNumber.com, the most numbers-tastic site on the web. Andrew’s mission is to promote numeracy and rationality by putting ‘big’ numbers into context. His excellent, fact-packed book Is That A Big Number?, which presents strategies for improving our understanding of numbers, is out this month.

What’s your favourite big number? Please leave your suggestions below!

I set a puzzle here every two weeks on a Monday. I’m always on the look-out for great puzzles. If you would like to suggest one, email me.

I’m the author of several books of popular maths, including the puzzle books Can You Solve My Problems? and Puzzle Ninja, which is out in paperback this week.

I also co-write the children’s book series Football School.