Why Does Googolplex Exist?

Kasner believed people overused the term “infinite” when they really only meant a large number, so he developed googol and googolplex to differentiate between the two concepts.

Is there a googolplex of anything?

There's not a googol of anything physical in the universe. On the other hand, numbers larger than a googol routinely arise in application. When you're counting potential things rather than physical things you can run into numbers much larger than a googol. This happens all the time in probability calculations.

Is googolplex bigger than infinity?

Almost inevitably, at this point someone proffers an even bigger number, “googolplex.” It is true that the word “googolplex” was coined to mean a one followed by a googol zeros. ... True enough, but there is nothing as large as infinity either: infinity is not a number. It denotes endlessness.