Probably the number of centimeters from one end to the other.

But might also be the number of inches from one end to the middle times 4 divided by 2.

O

A perfect illustration of the problem: one post with two answers.

It's exactly this problem that I'm trying to solve.

Ask some Cern people - they're supposed to be pretty smart.

Ahh, now I see what you were getting at: in giving me two answes you were actually giving me one (leave it!). It's like all answers are permitted until you make an observation. And thereby the reference to quantum and particle physics. Or the wave and particle nature of light and matter. Everything together. All answers, yet only one. You're pretty good, SiteAdmin, do you work at CERN?

Actualy, I'm a Supermodel, but I'm one of those smart supermodels you read about but never actualy meet.

And strangely enough, I did my thesis on string measurements...

A closed loop has no beginning and no end. Once you have started, how do you stop?

It's as long or as short as you want it to be ;)

That used to be my pickup line when I was single :-)

come on hayes, haven't you studied string theory? just ggogle it.lol

even better; how many rolls of toilet paper do you need to go from the earth to the moon?

answer: read tomorrow's forum

one

I guess it worked then!!

Is it the ring/set theory we learnt in Topology classes os something else dealing with counting?

What are you playing at Hayes - the right answer is not an option there in the Doodle!?

I would venture to say that the string is not relevant to this question, it's the piece we should be focusing on. A piece of string, a piece of salami and a piece of asteroid would all occupy the same dimensions as denoted by the nature of their existence as a piece.

The definitive piece (a bit like standard yard set into one of the walls of Trafalgar Square) is of course Dirty Harry's Smith and Wesson 657 .41 Magnum. This has a length of a clean 12 inches.

But 12" is not to be found in Hayes' Doodle, what's going on?

well, biscuit chafe, the ? in the !? that delimits your first sentence shows you yourself are a little doubtful about your venture. Even the canonical piece of gruyere and piece of appenzeller do not occupy the same dimension. for clarity, a you may want to consider the length of a peace of string.

Twice as long as half it's length. 

Do I win anything?!?!   haha!

how many rolls of toilet paper would it take to go from the earth to the moon?

ans: 1......if it´s long enough!

This was community-based assistnace in my research, not a competition. I don't have budget to cover prizes.

But OK, since you did so well, you can have a prize. You win the amount of wood that a woodchuck would chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood. I'll start a new thread to figure out just how much wood that is.

Sure what they find may look like the Higgs, quack like the Higgs and waddle like the Higgs, but it'll exhibit a slightly different spin. It may well be the Hayes boson; irritating all the other particles by giving them mass. The poor scientists will probably call it the Higgs anyway in the press-releases just to save face, but you know what it will really be.

I've said before that professionally I hope they don't find the Higgs or the LSP, but it's also a little personal.

Horizon: How Long is a Piece...
BBC2
Alan Davies attempts to answer the proverbial question: how long is a piece of string? But what appears to be a simple task soon turns into a mind-bending voyage of discovery where nothing is as it seems. An encounter with leading mathematician Marcus du Sautoy reveals that Alan's short length of string may in fact be infinitely long. When Alan attempts to measure his string at the atomic scale, objects appear in many places at once, and reality itself appears to be an illusion. AD SUB
Factual Science
Today on BBC2 from 9:00pm to 10:00pm