User:Charles R Greathouse IV/Physical constants

The OEIS includes a small number of physical constants like the speed of light c (A003678), the gravitational constant G (A070058), and the Rydberg constant $\scriptstyle R_{\infty }$ (A081821).

Units

While some constants are dimensionless, others depend on the choice of units. Some constants are given in some type of natural units, while others are given in SI or some other traditional system of measure.

I prefer to give constants in Planck units when possible, but it is reasonable to have some of the more popular constants in conventional units for the appropriate field as that is the form most likely to be searched. In any case conversions to other popular systems of units should be given in the comments or examples.

Number of terms

Only known terms should be included in the OEIS. For physical constants, our standards are somewhat relaxed: it is sufficient to give terms which fall within the standard uncertainty range.

For example, if a number is given as 0.123456(78), it is believed to lie in the range 0.123456 ± 0.000078 which is 0.123378 to 0.123534. (More particularly, the error is generally modeled as normal with mean 0.123456 and standard deviation 0.000078, making this a 1-sigma neighborhood expected to contain the true value 68% of the time.) So as a cons sequence only three terms should be entered, 1, 2, 3. As a continued fraction the situation is worse, as the expansions are 0; 8, 9, 1, ... and 0; 8, 10, 1, ... giving only a single term, 8.

See also

• The multi-faceted reach of the OEIS

External links

• Standard Uncertainty and Relative Standard Uncertainty