So are you gnostic or agnostic about randomness in the natural world... YES... or NO.... do you think there is randomness in the natural world or not?
Moderated Coin Flipper
So are you gnostic or agnostic about randomness in the natural world... YES... or NO.... do you think there is randomness in the natural world or not?
theprestige
Penultimate Amazing
My understanding is that you wrote your coin flipper and started this thread in order to produce and convey knowledge about randomness in the natural world.
But I'm not seeing it. All I'm seeing is an unsupported claim that artificial pseudorandomness can tell us something about natural randomness.
So where's your knowledge coming from?
Read the OP.
You are Agnostic about randomness in the natural world... as you said...
So that means you lack knowledge about randomness in the natural world.
So until you gain knowledge about it and stop being agnostic and you know one way or the other if there is randomness or not in the natural world... forgive me if I am not at all interested in any of your further Argumenta ad Ignorantiam.
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The set of Numbers is infinite... yet not a single member of the set is repeated ever...
Humans count in the billions right now and not a single one is the same... not even identical twins.
So whether there are infinite universes or not (I say not)... there is no other Leumas who is like me doing the same as I.... this concept comes from the same TYPE OF amusing fertile imaginations that gave us Leprechauns and Elves or Gods.
I agree, it's just a fun sci-fi idea. But if it were true, infinite would literally mean infinite, so things would have to repeat, no matter how unlikely, because there aren't infinite ways events can go.
Do members of an infinite set of numbers ever repeat because it is infinite and thus literally infinite?
How many combinations can you have with the numbers 1, 20, & 300 that do not repeat?
How many combinations can you have with an infinite set of numbers that do not repeat?
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I'm not sure what you mean?
If we're talking about your simulator, there should be a 1 in "really large number" chance that all coin throws turn up heads after a billion tries, otherwise you have a bad simulator.
If we're talking about reality, I don't think there's an infinite number of possible states.
jsfisher
ETcorngods survivor
- Joined
- Dec 23, 2005
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You didn't answer my question. Would have been a nice incentive for me to consider yours. But thanks, at least, for the lack of bold emphasis in your post.
But you are not.... you are talking about a scifi myth of infinite universes repeating themselves so as to have multiple mythical versions of me doing mythical things in some of the infinite mythical universe.
I am not a myth nor is this universe in which my all but mythical app exists.
And thus I asked you how many combinations of three numbers can you have that do not repeat.... lets say 1,20,300
The answer is
1
20
300
1, 20
1, 300
20, 300
1, 20, 300
----------
Total 7 combinations and that is assuming 1,2 is the same as 2,1... if they are not then there will be 15 combinations.
so 3 UNIQUE numbers can be put together in 7 (15) different UNIQUE combinations.
So now if you have INFINITE UNIQUE numbers ... can you see how you can have an infinite number of UNIQUE combinations that is even a bigger set of elements???
So when you say
You are definitively WRONG.
That is what I am talking about.
Ok...
- Try it in real life
- Try it on my simulator
- See what happens
Then come back and tell me the result... until then you are just engaging in bare assertions.
I just gave you an example of an infinite number of possible states above... so again you are demonstrably WRONG!!!
Note: If you try the coin tosses IN REAL LIFE for a billion tosses... how long do you expect it to take you? Do you know how many years there are in a billion seconds? How many seconds does it take to do the toss, pick it up again and repeat? And how many times are you going to repeat this every time you get a Tails at try number 999,999,999?
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Ok... then I will take your objections as an affirmation that you do not believe that there is randomness in the natural world.
Thanks for that implicit answer!!!
I have to read up on multiverse theory, so I'll get back to you on that one.
However, while the many-worlds interpretation might be pure sci-fi, this is just basic math, so I don't know what your issue is here? There's a 1 in 1024 chance for 10 consecutive heads, and there's a 1 in n chance for a billion consecutive heads. The fact that it isn't practical doesn't mean it isn't part of randomness.
However, while the many-worlds interpretation might be pure sci-fi, this is just basic math, so I don't know what your issue is here? There's a 1 in 1024 chance for 10 consecutive heads, and there's a 1 in n chance for a billion consecutive heads. The fact that it isn't practical doesn't mean it isn't part of randomness.
It is unfalsifiable claptrap.
The probability of getting 1 Billion consecutive heads in 1 Billion tosses is
(1/2)1E9 = 1/(21E9) ≈ 0
In other words n = 21E9... i.e. 1 in 21E9... try to calculate that value.
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Thermal
August Member
Ah, but the Law of Probability states that a coin is just as likely to come up head as tails, and should therefore cause no surprise whatsoever each and every time it does.
Yes... but that is not what is being said.
Let's say a casino is offering the odds of 1025 to 1... i.e. it will pay you $1025 for your $1, if the result of 10 executive tosses of a coin come up all heads.
If it is all heads the casino will pay you $1025 if not you lose the $1.
OK...
How many times are you willing to bet $1 at a time or even more $$$ at a time?
If you sit and watch for 1023 rounds without betting... are you willing to bet $1000 the next time.... after all it is 1 in 1024 chance so for the last 1023 rounds it never came up... are you now ready to bet $1000 and get $1,025,000 nearly 1 million dollars so easily?
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Thermal
August Member
I was referencing a line from the Stoppard play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead. The opening scene has them flipping coins, which all come up heads over and over.
Ah... I see... I don't know that one.... was it meant to be a con in the play?
Anyways... in the above casino, if you sit and watch for 1023 rounds without betting... are you willing to bet $1000 the next time.... after all it is 1 in 1024 chance so for the last 1023 rounds it never came up... are you now ready to bet $1000 and get $1,025,000 nearly 1 million dollars so easily?
Why not use the app Coin Flipper 2 or Coin Flipper and try it out without having to lose any dollars... see what will happen!!
Thermal
August Member
Yes, it was a literal everyday gold coin. If you don't get a chance to see the actual play, a movie was made by the same name featuring Tim Roth, Gary Oldman, and Richard Dreyfuss. Really outstanding humor, and I think you would thoroughly enjoy the wordplay.
ETA: if you meant a scammy "con", then not really. It was symbolic of an otherworldly kind of foreshadowing, about fate and our lack of control or understanding of it. Really excellent show.
As I opined earlier, I don't get where you are going with the app thingy. AFAICT, it's a pseudo random generator. That has little relevance to the mechanics of actual coin tossing. The results were predictable: odds floated around the 50 yard line.
What might be more interesting would be how many times in a given set the probability hit precisely 50/50 (assuming v1). I would say it did so many, many times, and it is likely that if you sat there doing it over and over, a truly random generator would show hitting the 50/50 line many times each set.
But without seeing the generator, you could have made an app that outputs percentages that are closer to 50/50 as trial sizes are increased, and has nothing whatsoever to do with actual coin flipping odds. It may simply be a program which will never read 50%, but always a small percentage off.
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