Going past the float size limits?

[Carl Banks]

On Oct 26, 8:00 pm, Grant Edwards <gra... at visi.com> wrote:
> On 2007-10-26, jimmy.musselwh... at gmail.com <jimmy.musselwh... at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >> What in the world are you trying to count?
>
> > The calculation looks like this
>
> > A = 0.35
> > T = 0.30
> > C = 0.25
> > G = 0.10
>
> The bases in DNA?
>
> > and then I basically continually multiply those numbers together. I
> > need to do it like 200,000+ times but that's nuts.
>
> Exactly.  It sure looks like what you're doing is nuts.
>
> > I can't even do it 1000 times or the number rounds off to 0.0.
> > I tried taking the inverse of these numbers as I go but then
> > it just shoots up to "inf".
>
> Can you explain what it is you're trying to calculate?

Looks pretty obviously to be a calculation of the probability that
bases in the given ratios would randomly form a particular sequence.

What use this would be I cannot tell.


Carl Banks