# Math Help - hamster/human time question

1. ## hamster/human time question

I need some help with a math problem! This is really difficult because time is measured 60 sec / 60 minutes /

The 2 questions i have to solve are:

1. Assuming hamsters live for 3 years, what % is 5 minutes of a hamster's overall life span?
2. Assuming humans live for 70 years, what is the equivalent amount of time in a human's life span?

Question 1:

According to Google, 1 year = 525,948.766 mins

So 3 years is 1,577,846.298 mins

So 1,577,846.298 / 5 = 5.2814607759299843623509476544283e-5
so 5 mins is 5% of the hamster's life?is that right?It doesn't sound right to me

Question 2:

70 years = 36,816,413.62 mins

36,816,413.62 / 100 x 5 = 1,840,820.681 mins

2. Originally Posted by trumpeter
I need some help with a math problem! This is really difficult because time is measured 60 sec / 60 minutes /

The 2 questions i have to solve are:

1. Assuming hamsters live for 3 years, what % is 5 minutes of a hamster's overall life span?
2. Assuming humans live for 70 years, what is the equivalent amount of time in a human's life span?

Question 1:

According to Google, 1 year = 525,948.766 mins

So 3 years is 1,577,846.298 mins

So 1,577,846.298 / 5 = 5.2814607759299843623509476544283e-5
so 5 mins is 5% of the hamster's life?is that right?It doesn't sound right to me
(5/1,577,846.298)*100 is the required percentage, which is about 0.0003%

CB

3. Originally Posted by trumpeter
I need some help with a math problem! This is really difficult because time is measured 60 sec / 60 minutes /

The 2 questions i have to solve are:

1. Assuming hamsters live for 3 years, what % is 5 minutes of a hamster's overall life span?
2. Assuming humans live for 70 years, what is the equivalent amount of time in a human's life span?

Question 1:

According to Google, 1 year = 525,948.766 mins

So 3 years is 1,577,846.298 mins

So 1,577,846.298 / 5 = 5.2814607759299843623509476544283e-5
so 5 mins is 5% of the hamster's life?is that right?It doesn't sound right to me

Question 2:

70 years = 36,816,413.62 mins

36,816,413.62 / 100 x 5 = 1,840,820.681 mins

Hi trumpeter,

First, I'm a bit confused how google came up with that number of minutes.

1 year X 365.25 days X 24 hours X 60 minutes = 525960 minutes in a year.

So, 3 years X 525960 minures = 1577880 minutes

5 minutes / 1577880 minutes = .000003 = .0003% of the hampster's life expectancy.(What CB said!)

The second part of your question now. I don't understand the restriction you put on yourself, but here's how I think it is.

70 years X 365.25 days X 24 hours X 60 minutes = 36817200 minutes.

Now solve the proportion:

$\frac{5}{1577880}=\frac{x}{36817200}$

So 5 minutes to a hamster would be equivalent to x minutes to a human.

4. That's great, thank you!

I dont know why my windows calculator keeps giving me wrong answers though -

I put it 5 / 1577880 and get = 3.1688087814028950237026896848937e-7

5. Originally Posted by trumpeter
That's great, thank you!

I dont know why my windows calculator keeps giving me wrong answers though -

I put it 5 / 1577880 and get = 3.1688087814028950237026896848937e-7
It was said in CB's first post...if you want to get the percentage you're going to have to multiply that by 100.

6. Originally Posted by trumpeter
That's great, thank you!

I dont know why my windows calculator keeps giving me wrong answers though -

I put it 5 / 1577880 and get = 3.1688087814028950237026896848937e-7

i get 3.1688087814028950237026896848937e-6

what you can do is once you get this on your calculator just do plus 1 and you can see the actual number clearer.

second question you dont even have to convert to minutes because we are dealing with proportionality;
$\frac{5}{3}=\frac{x}{70}$ and solve for x

7. Originally Posted by Krahl
second question you dont even have to convert to minutes because we are dealing with proportionality;
$\frac{5}{3}=\frac{x}{70}$ and solve for x
Krahl,

Much better than the approach I presented.

Quote from a move Excess Baggage (1997):

"We can do this the hard way or the easy way."
"What's the hard way?"
"It's...it's harder than the easy way."