The expression means that 8 must be multiplied 8 times by itself. Considering 8*8 = 64, every time this expression is multiplied by 8, it will become larger than 64. Since 64 > 1, the expression will be larger than one.
It takes 1/2 hours to drive from A-ville to B-town. It takes three-fifths of the time it takes to drive from A-ville to B-town to drive from B-town to C City.