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Numbers are often rounded to avoid reporting insignificant gures. For example, it would create false precision to express a measurement as 12.34500 kg (which
has seven signicant gures) if the scales only measured
to the nearest gram and gave a reading of 12.345 kg
(which has ve signicant gures) . Numbers can also
be rounded merely for simplicity rather than to indicate
a given precision of measurement, for example to make
them faster to pronounce in news broadcasts.
A bar may be placed over the last significant gure; any trailing zeros following
this are insignicant. For example, 1300
has three signicant gures (and hence
indicates that the number is precise to the
nearest ten).
3 ARITHMETIC
However, these conventions are not universally used, and it is often necessary to determine from context whether such trailing zeros are intended to be signicant. If all else
fails, the level of rounding can be specied
explicitly. The abbreviation s.f. is sometimes used, for example 20 000 to 2 s.f. or
20 000 (2 sf)". Alternatively, the uncertainty
can be stated separately and explicitly with a
plus-minus sign, as in 20 000 1%, so that
signicant-gures rules do not apply. This also
allows specifying a precision in-between powers of ten (or whatever the base power of the
numbering system is).
1.1
Scientic notation
In most cases, the same rules apply to numbers expressed in scientic notation. However, in the normalized form of that notation, placeholder leading and
trailing digits do not occur, so all digits are signicant.
For example, 0.00012 (two signicant gures) becomes
1.2104 , and 0.00122300 (six signicant gures) becomes 1.22300103 . In particular, the potential ambiguity about the signicance of trailing zeros is eliminated.
For example, 1300 to four signicant gures is written as
1.300103 , while 1300 to two signicant gures is written as 1.3103 .
The part of the representation that contains the signicant As an illustration, the decimal quantity 12.345 can be exgures (as opposed to the base or the exponent) is known pressed with various numbers of signicant digits or decimal places. If insucient precision is available then the
as the signicand or mantissa.
number is rounded in some manner to t the available
Alternatively: 1. All non-zero digits are signicant 2. In a
precision. The following table shows the results for varnumber without a decimal point, only zeros between nonious total precisions and decimal places rounded to the
zero digits are signicant. 3. In a number with a decimal
nearest value using the round-to-even method.
point, all zeros to the right of the rst non-zero digits are
The representation of a positive number x to a precision
signicant.
of p signicant digits has a numerical value that is given
by the formula:
3 Arithmetic
Main article: Signicance arithmetic
3
A common guide often used when performing calcula- 0.0031 == 1.004.[6]
tions by hand is as follows.
For multiplication and division, the result should have as
many signicant gures as the measured number with the
smallest number of signicant gures.
6 Estimation
For addition and subtraction, the result should have as Main article: Estimation
many decimal places as the measured number with the
smallest number of decimal places (for example, 100.0 + When estimating the proportion of individuals carrying
1.111 = 101.1).
some particular characteristic in a population, from a ranIn a base 10 logarithm of a normalized number, the result dom sample of that population, the number of signicant
should be rounded to the number of signicant gures in gures should not exceed the maximum precision allowed
the normalized number. For example, log10 (3.000104 ) by that sample size. The correct number of signicant
= log10 (104 ) + log10 (3.000) 4 + 0.47712125472, gures is given by the order of magnitude of sample size.
This can be found by taking the base 10 logarithm of samshould be rounded to 4.4771.
ple size and rounding to the nearest integer.
When taking antilogarithms, the resulting number should
have as many signicant gures as the mantissa in the For example, in a poll of 120 randomly chosen viewers of a regularly visited web page we nd that 10 peologarithm.
ple disagree with a proposition on that web page. The
When performing a calculation, do not follow these
order of magnitude of our sample size is Log10 (120) =
guidelines for intermediate results; keep as many digits
2.0791812460... which rounds to 2. Our estimated proas is practical (at least 1 more than implied by the preportion of people who disagree with the proposition is
cision of the nal result) until the end of calculation to
therefore 0.083, or 8.3%, with 2 signicant gures. This
[5]
avoid cumulative rounding errors.
is because in dierent samples of 120 people from this
population, our estimate would vary in units of 1/120,
and any additional gures would misrepresent the size of
4 Estimating tenths
our sample by giving spurious precision. To interpret our
estimate of the number of viewers who disagree with the
When using a ruler, initially use the smallest mark as the proposition we should then calculate some measure of our
rst estimated digit. For example, if a rulers smallest condence in this estimate.
mark is cm, and 4.5 cm is read, it is 4.5 (0.1 cm) or 4.4
4.6 cm.
It is possible that the overall length of a ruler may not be 7 Relationship to accuracy and preaccurate to the degree of the smallest mark and the marks
cision in measurement
may be imperfectly spaced within each unit. However
assuming a normal good quality ruler, it should be possible to estimate tenths between the nearest two marks to Main article: Accuracy and precision
achieve an extra decimal place of accuracy. Failing to do
this adds the error in reading the ruler to any error in the In various technical elds, accuracy refers to the closecalibration of the ruler.
ness of a given measurement to its true value; precision
refers to the stability of that measurement when repeated
many times. The number of signicant gures roughly
corresponds to precision, not accuracy.
Calculation
When multiplying several quantities, the number of signicant gures in the nal answer is the number of signicant gures in the factor having the least number of
signicant gures (the least precise). For example, given
the two measurements 16.3 cm (0.1 cm) and 4.5 cm
(0.1 cm), the range is: 16.2*4.4 16.4*4.6 (71.28
75.44) cm2 and the average is 73.36; however, only two
signicant gures (i.e. 73 cm2 ) can be claimed in the
result (the area calculated).
8 In computing
Main article: Floating point
Computer representations of oating point numbers typically use a form of rounding to signicant gures, but
with binary numbers. The number of correct signicant
gures is closely related to the notion of relative error
When adding numbers, the number of decimal places in (which has the advantage of being a more accurate meathe result is the smallest of the number decimal places in sure of precision, and is independent of the radix of the
any term. For example, 123 + 5.35 == 128 and 1.001 + number system used).
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See also
Accuracy and precision
Benfords Law (First Digit Law)
Engineering notation
Error bar
False precision
IEEE754 (IEEE oating point standard)
Interval arithmetic
Kahan summation algorithm
Precision (computer science)
Round-o error
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References
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Further reading
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External links
EXTERNAL LINKS
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