Copernican Principle Calculator

Current Amount of Time

units
(days, months, years, whatever)
(e.g. "123" or "0.025")

Confidence Interval

confidence %
(between 50 and 99)

The above units field is limited to six digits. If you need more, just use larger units, such as "66.1" [million years] or "13.8" [billion years].

Expected Duration

Minimum:

Maximum:

So, for example, if you know that a particular rock has been sitting on a fencepost for six months, and you are wondering how long it will likely remain there, you could enter "0.5" in the "units" box, above, to represent half a year. Then you might enter "90" in the "confidence %" box, if you want predictions that have a confidence level (confidence interval) of 90 percent.

This would give you a result of 0.0263 for the "Minimum" and 9.5000 for the "Maximum" value. This means that we can be 90 percent confident that the rock will be there for at least 0.0263 more years (or 9.6 days), but no longer than 9.5 years.

How much longer will it last?
Confidence Levels: 10% through 90%. Use the graph below to visualize the most likely outcomes.

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