>>12154769This is the closest correct figure for the greatest possible number of bearings that could fit in a conventionally shaped container of ideal dimensions (like a cylinder, sphere, hexagonal prism, etc.). The container geometry is very relevant for determining how each layer will shave away at the actual packing efficiency. Actually, given the way the maximum theoretical packing is determined as a unit cell, you could TECHNICALLY exceed this value if your container had very odd geometry;
>>12154757 pointed this out pretty well. In addition, this has assumed the ball bearings are rigid bodies. Assuming we had an adequate cramming force and a capable container, we could fit a near arbitrary number of bearings into a finite space if you are very loose with the definition of "ball bearing" at that point. Then we could approach the conception of a black hole with a large enough density similar to the suggestion by
>>12154924I don't know much about topology and manifolds, but I bet we could fuck around with some higher dimension shit and cram even more in somehow.
