On Friday 16 May 2008 10:54:31 am paul at clubi.ie wrote:
> If they're not random processes, then they are systems so complex as
> to be far beyond our capacity to model them (for the foreseeable
> future at least), is my understanding. I.e. they're still far better
> PRNGs than our mathematical ones (at heart).
This is pure wishful thinking.
You are saying that if _you_ cannot work out what the next number is,
because the system is so complicated,
then the sequence must be random.
The belief that some guy is going to give you a black box
that emits random numbers is pure snake-oil,
even if the salesman tells you it is guaranteed by quantum theory.
You are much, much better off with a mathematical function f(n) mod m
which people have studied, and found no patterns in the output.
--
Timothy Murphy
e-mail: gayleard /at/ eircom.net
tel: +353-86-2336090, +353-1-2842366
s-mail: School of Mathematics, Trinity College, Dublin 2, Ireland
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