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Yet Another Stupid Question in Metaphysics

Posted: Mon Aug 16, 2021 3:41 am
by Robert Arvay
I saw this quite some time ago in a Dilbert comic strip.
There was a machine that generates random numbers.
One by one, it printed them out.
They were: 9, 9, 9, 9, 9, 9, 9, 9, 9, etc, always a nine.

Someone said, that does not seem very random to me.

Another said, that's the problem with randomness--you
can never be sure.

AFAIK, in theory, TRULY random numbers COULD be like that.
In multi-verse theory, there MUST be infinite numbers of
universes in which utterly improbable things always happen,
such as in the comic strip.
And there must be sentient humans who perceive them,
but can never make any sense out of any of it.

So, the stupid question is, can there be any such thing as
true randomness?
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Re: Yet Another Stupid Question in Metaphysics

Posted: Mon Aug 16, 2021 10:37 am
by Martin_
Quantum mechnics?

What do you mean with truly random.

Re: Yet Another Stupid Question in Metaphysics

Posted: Mon Aug 16, 2021 5:26 pm
by Martin_
Robert Arvay wrote: Mon Aug 16, 2021 3:41 am And there must be sentient humans who perceive them,
but can never make any sense out of any of it.

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My guess is that most of those humans would dismiss that number sequence as "impossible" claiming that there must be a design flaw
in the machinery which produced it, and then go about their day as if nothing special happened.

Except for the engineer who built the thing who will eventually commit suicide after spending 40 yrs trying to convince the rest of humanity
that there's actually a miracle going on...

Re: Yet Another Stupid Question in Metaphysics

Posted: Tue Aug 17, 2021 2:15 pm
by Hedge90
Robert Arvay wrote: Mon Aug 16, 2021 3:41 am
In multi-verse theory, there MUST be infinite numbers of
universes in which utterly improbable things always happen,
such as in the comic strip.

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Yep, I sometimes thought about that there must be universes where people think that D&D magic is real, because every time someone made a give magical incantation and raised their hand, a fireball flew out of it. They now all think it's causally related, while it's simply a very improbable effect of quantum uncertainty.
I'm pretty sure many-worlds theory is bullshit.