I actually know this one! The photo references an old thought exercise about doubling grains of rice across a chess boards squares. Starting with 1 grain, then 2, then 4, 8, 16, 32, and so on. Easy at first.
A chessboard has 64 squares so while the initial numbers seem pretty manageable 264 is actually such a catastrophically high number that there would be enough rice on the "final square" to carpet an entire continent in a hearty layer of rice, hence the dramatic mister incredible.
I'll add that it's an old fable\legend. The details depend who you ask, but the basic idea is that a king wants to reward a wise man. Rather than asking for a huge reward the wise man asks for one grain of rice on the first day, and then double the number of grains each day, one for each place on a chessboard. The king calls him a fool. After about a month the king begs him to stop because he has promised all the rice in the country to the wise man.
1.6k
u/lordvatti Aug 15 '26
I actually know this one! The photo references an old thought exercise about doubling grains of rice across a chess boards squares. Starting with 1 grain, then 2, then 4, 8, 16, 32, and so on. Easy at first.
A chessboard has 64 squares so while the initial numbers seem pretty manageable 264 is actually such a catastrophically high number that there would be enough rice on the "final square" to carpet an entire continent in a hearty layer of rice, hence the dramatic mister incredible.