You can have an idea of orders of magnitude though, say a billion is a cube 1000 units on each side. That is, a meter cubed with units of 1mm. Actually you coul

You can have an idea of orders of magnitude though, say a billion is a cube 1000 units on each side. That is, a meter cubed with units of 1mm. Actually you could have such a thing on the kitchen table. Edit: now a trillion, that's getting beyond comprehension. Just multiply each side by 10. Edit edit: that "1 billion" would make for a good conversation piece. Or, easier, a container with 1 billion small grains in it.