Yes, I seem to have missed an enormous factor, 9 orders of magnitude! Thank you!
- However, we can also look at it the other way, i.e., if the time taken is 10 billion years, then the mass removed by each stroke is about 36 × 10^-9 grams. The correct numbers could be somewhere in between.
- So, I need to think about how to correct it. Either way, it shows the magnitude of the time scale.