i was wondering...how do computers come up with random numbers?

if you think in reverse.
someone presses a button.
the rand(); (or equivalent) function is called.
then what are the options?

there are many ways for a computer to come up with random numbers, but all the ones i can possibly imagine fit in one of these two groups:

1. those that require other random numbers. e.g, the cpu can take a random piece of memory and hash it, and fit it into the specified range « where does it get the randomness for the random piece of memory?
2. those that are not very random at all. e.g, the computer takes the 2nd, 51st and 563rd bytes in memory and does some calculations with them and fits them into the specified range « if someone knows which bytes the pc will take then the calculations can be figured out and the random number can be predicted, and is not random (because it is based on something)

when you think about it, no number can ever be random. randomness is inexistent. think of a random word right now. lets bet you've read or heard it, or seen the object it refers to within the past 24 hours or so. if not, than there must be another reason why this word was given the priority in your brain over other words that are stored in your short-term memory. maybe its because it somehow relates to something you're thinking about. for example, when i did this myself, the word i came up with is 'zorg'. double you tee eff, i thought to myself? zorg? omg, how could i come up with such a word? but after typing this, i realised there are some links. for example, im now writing this thing thinking of random numbers. when i think of random number generating things, i get a weird image of a big flashing machine giving ppl tickets with random numbers on them » zorg? or this. zorg is a text-based game, which i havent seen or played in more than an month. But, before i started writing this ive been reading and learning about C++.NET for a few hours, and the command line interface looks the same as zorg cause its text-based (runs in a dos prompt). also, when i try to make an image in my head of someone saying zorg, the image is a cosplaying nerd dude « otaku and ive been watching a few episodes of Lucky Star today as well which stars an otaku manga freak.

so even though the links are somewhat weak, and sometimes hard to describe at all, there are reasons for certain numbers, words, thoughts or actions to pop out at certain moments or when triggered by other numbers, words, thoughts, actions or whatevers. randomness is inexistent. if you exaggerate this even more, this would mean that nothing in the universe is ever random, but very indirectly related to something else at best. this is also what science relies on. so it all makes sense. and then if you think about it even more (but this conclusion depends on your religion, i am atheist (aka objective) and therefore this is what my mind comes up with), then if random is inexistent, and gods and such things as 'mother nature' or 'luck' are the most random thing you can think of, then they must be inexistent as well. come to think of it, these so called (but inexistent) 'random' influences that happen to people, are the things that trigger the mind to conclude that there must be a god or something controlling it. but as i said before, even though they may seem improbably, impossible or you can't come up with them because they are so very indirectly or so very slightly related, there MUST be a reason for something else to happen. the fact that humans were/are unable to precisely identify these links, leads to the illusion that they are either random or controlled by something unknown. however, if all humans were to completely forget everything, and simply remember that randomness is inexistent and EVERYTHING has a cause in some way, then things such as gods and therefore religion would have NEVER EVER existed. and thus i conclude, that religion is based on ignorance.

wow omg
this stuff ^^ above was all typed up at the precise moment that i was thinking it up, concluding myself after every sentence i typed.. woot. i had no idea this would turn out to be a religion bashing story at all and i couldve covered much more but i limited myself to this along the way cause that's just where my head went. oh and ive still got to say that even if computers really could come up with 'random' numbers then they would STILL not be random because computers are programmed and designed by humans, who have certain thoughts etc etc etc. randomness is inexistent in my opinion now, taking down with it coincidence, religion and any other results of the lack of understanding.


comments?
by the way don't be easy on me or try to refrain from insulting anybody, i didnt either. maybe i should put stuff like this on my own site though but i don't really have one :P

Many good points

I agree randomness is inexistent.

It was a good read, your very smart, you should write a book!

wait lets add some stuff

based on the first post, i can redefine some things:


- luck: the fact that something with a very slight chance to occur has happened to you or has happened at a fortunate moment.
and if you think of religion in a much more logical way, you can describe it as:
- religion: the appreciation and respecting of luck and all good things , padded and padded over the years with nonsense for people's own benefit or processed by people's minds unconsciously to result in a skewed version etc etc
- superstition: the art of trying to improve the chances of luck happening to you, in ways which are related to religion. the reason that these methods are seen as useless or nonsense is because they are mostly based on the meaningless padding that accumulated on religion over the years and generations
- philosophy: the study of trying to find arguments against randomness, mostly nonsense though if you just keep in mind that randomness is inexistent, and then it sort of becomes science.
- science: the study of trying to uncover the unclear links between occurrences in different cases and in different ways.

most other -ologies can be categorized into the above groups. interestingly, theology can be considered a science, thus is actually the art of proving that religion is is not the answer, and therefore actually contradicting itself. lol

YoYoBalls Wrote:Many good points

I agree randomness is inexistent.

It was a good read, your very smart, you should write a book!

wow i had sort of given up on the fact that this was actually any good because im still just some teenager who doesn't know anything about what other people have already concluded on this subject, and im too lazy to learn about philosophy and stuff, but i used to always think (when i was younger) that everyone around me was being stupid and it all made so much sense in my head. but later, i realised that im not the only one with these thoughts, but then again i also realised that everything anyone ever thinks is biased (for the same reasons actually as that randomness doesn't exist, think about that), and that it actually doesn't really matter because because of all this biassing everywhere people arent going to listen anyway because they already have their minds set so it doesn't really matter at all to anyone so you might as well not think about it which kind of demotivates me, which then makes me sad because the thing i have always seemed to be so good at and all my beliefs and thoughts that sometimes explode in my head in the form of a blogpost such as this are in fact useless in life because they don't matter and they are based on limited knowledge, but they will always be based on limited knowledge and are influenced by the different knowledges that i happen to have or even more in fact by the knowledges that i do not have, so the entire purpose of it makes no sense at all and i might as well not do it because it will never ever make sense because one person can not be right due to the fact that everything is biased, and things such as babies being possesed do not exist according to the thoughts that i have. SO IN THE END, IT DOEsn't EVEN MATTERRRRRRR (quote linkin park).

so taking that above sentence that i could have continued into eternity, or into a book as you said, you can conclude that the human race is indeed placed on this earth with no clue at all as to what the so called 'meaning of life' is, because you can think about it as much as you want but you can never ever come up with a correct answer. you can't ever come up with a correct answer, because everything is based on something else and if the answer isn't already there, it can not be correctly concluded. so in fact, you could just live with the thought that one persons purpose in life is to not waste time thinking about the purpose of life at all, cause you won't get satisfaction out of it. but then again that means in the end dieing satisfied is the purpose in life, which is sort of true though you won't actually serve the human race any purpose if you just 'die satisfied', so that isn't the answer either. see what i mean? so really, i should stop thinking and typing here and just go to sleep, look where ive gotten all because you said i was smart and should write a book. i could in fact continue this and write a whole book, but it would be meaningless as every word i have typed in this thread is in fact meaningless.

ugh. what i mean to say is, i could spend time on this and write a book, but the only semi-useful thing that anyone would get out of that is money, which can be used for totally different things. come to think of it, maybe i could reconsider and in fact write a book :P though, i would have made more money if i did it earlier in life (and i could cause my thoughts havent changed much, except my knowledge and understanding of things). and if i write a book about not wasting time writing a book like that, it would be kind of pointless and it wouldnt really sell i guess. so again, what i mean to say is, it doesn't matter, cause this is just what my brain comes up with now and then, the fact that it makes sense to others is just because its based on pure logic, and because randomness is inexistent, everything is based on logic. but that does not mean, that everything that is based on logic, is true. in some way. which i will not explain, even though i probably could.

oh and also, nevermind (i forgot what i was going to say, but nevermind seems a good thing to say as well lol)oh yeah i remember what i was going to add:

whatever i write is not only limited by knowledge, but also language. everything i write is using words, and words are simple defined by assumptions other humans make. the fact that i need to translate what's in my brainwaves to things such as 'sense', 'logic', 'randomness' etc doesn't really happen seamlessly, and these words all depend on the interpretation by the reader's brain (translating the 'words' back into brainwaves). probably, the words that my brain makes me type after trying to figure out how to convert thoughts into english (or whatever language), will convert back into COMPLETELY different brainwaves in the person who reads it. this is again caused by biassing. because persons conclusions are based on previous knowledge and thoughts (and 'beliefs'), and your brains operation is based on concluding previous conclusions with each other, that means that everyones thoughts are COMPLETELY different as well so even telepathy wouldnt work better than words if you want to tell someone something. geez, the world is getting even more pathetic and lost as i type, every keystroke i wonder more what will happen to the world in the end and i constantly bounce between the question 'why does this universe exist' and the thought 'i just said i shouldnt be thinking about that because it won't work anyway'. this depresses me lol, i can understand that if people follow about the same thoughts as i do right now but take it a stage further that it makes a REALLY good motive for suicide. i will NOT cover insanity though.

(This post was last modified: 02/06/2007 09:20 AM by Ge64.)

oh and you may notice that the pace of what i write is extremely fast, that's cause i just type as i think and i try to keep up with my brain. what i just wrote above here would be enough to fill an entire series of books if i just used more words or described what i was actually thinking in more detail. i guess its just in my nature that i can't be f*ucked to write more words just to make it easier for other people to understand it, which means im egocentric because i don't care and i just want to type what i think for some reason which i don't know and if you don't understand it or you can't make sense out of that i wrote because i think too fast to punctuate, then you werent meant to understand it and i don't care « woow im really not nice at all in this case :P

show off :P

so you see, now i keep thinking about this and keep adding and adding stuff to it. so about me again, ive concluded that if you get me started on something like this (or like in this case, i get myself started on it) then i won't stop. i won't ever stop, unless i am for some reason forced to stop by other thoughts that (for some reason) gain in priority, e.g. if im talking with someone in person about it but they have to leave and theres no1 left to talk to i stop. or if my thoughts convince me to stop (i tried to above but apparantly it hasn't worked yet) and other things such as real-life obligations back that up, i may stop. or if i fall asleep, it stops too. i also notice that these explosions of thoughts only happen when im tired and/or when someone or something triggers subjects like this and i don't have much better to do and i keep thinking about it, concluding concluding concluding along the way eventually coming to the point where i conclude that i don't have any more conclusions.

when i sleep it stops, and it usually happens when im tired (after school) or in the evenings or at night (like now), so for some reason it must be that my brain is weak at the time and it easily drifts away in thoughts like this. when i sleep it stops and in the morning it all doesn't make anymore sense at all and i am forced to conclude that it was just another one of those thought explosions that don't mean anything or don't really make any sense. is anyone actually reading all of this? sorry, but in that case you must be contaminated now.i should stop now shouldnt i, cause the longer i think about it the more it wears off and the less sense it all makes. i feel im retuning to my normal self now so i think ill go sleep. i have to return completely before i sleep though cause if i don't im sure i will spend tomorrow reading back on this and i don't want to waste my time and forget about the plans i made lol so lets see, what was i doing. o yeah, i was learning how to programyep u guys just got to witness the 'other me' at work </acting important>

You say that randomness is inexistant and that this is proof that religion is based on ignorance? You sir, are an idiot.

The final statement of your rant is a contradiction. The very basis of religion (mine, at least) is that wee weren't born of some cosmic accident. The fundamental principle is that wee were deliberately created and live our lives with a purpose. If there is no randomness and no supernatural force how did wee come to be? There surely wasn't any big bang because that was randomness, and there wasn't any divine creation because because that's the product of unknown or supernatural forces.

Next time you decide to bash religion, think it through a little better.

Randomness is inexistent eh?
Well, according to Quantum theory, randomness or unpredictability does exist.
Many scientists/philosophers etc, eg Einstein, believed otherwise, however.


Anyways:
http://random.org/  «- closest you can probably get to random numbers.

Also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pseudo-rand..._generator
for anyone interested in how computers generate random numbers.

(This post was last modified: 02/06/2007 05:39 PM by ZiNgA BuRgA.)

Ge64 Wrote:- religion: the appreciation and respecting of luck and all good things , padded and padded over the years with nonsense for people's own benefit or processed by people's minds unconsciously to result in a skewed version etc etc

Actually, wee need to make a LOT of assumptions to even begin to think of such things.  For example, wee generally assume wee exist, and that wee can think for ourselves.  There are a whole load of other pre-assumptions wee must make.
Religion can be thought of as just some differing assumptions/beliefs which may be true - no-one knows whether it's true or not, how useful it is etc etc.
Personally though, I don't have a religion.

Ge64 Wrote:- superstition: the art of trying to improve the chances of luck happening to you, in ways which are related to religion. the reason that these methods are seen as useless or nonsense is because they are mostly based on the meaningless padding that accumulated on religion over the years and generations

Lol :)

Ge64 Wrote:- philosophy: the study of trying to find arguments against randomness, mostly nonsense though if you just keep in mind that randomness is inexistent, and then it sort of becomes science.

Not really.  Philosophy is trying to reason things which aren't yet known, for example, finding logical proofs of whether a God exists or not.  I find philosophy interesting, and it's actually also interesting to see the attempts made to logically proove God's existence or inexistence. (that's if you're interested)

Ge64 Wrote:most other -ologies can be categorized into the above groups. interestingly, theology can be considered a science, thus is actually the art of proving that religion is is not the answer, and therefore actually contradicting itself. lol

Actually, theology cannot be considered to be a science, so your initial assumption is incorrect :P

Ge64 Wrote:of all this biassing everywhere people arent going to listen anyway because they already have their minds set so it doesn't really matter at all to anyone

I wouldn't say it that way, as generally people can accept some differing views, but, yes, people tend to be biased towards their own opinions.

Ge64 Wrote:you can conclude that the human race is indeed placed on this earth

Actually, you can't... without making a tonne of pre-assumptions.

Ge64 Wrote:you could just live with the thought that one persons purpose in life is to not waste time thinking about the purpose of life at all, cause you won't get satisfaction out of it. but then again that means in the end dieing satisfied is the purpose in life, which is sort of true though you won't actually serve the human race any purpose if you just 'die satisfied', so that isn't the answer either

Lol.  An over-simplistic look there :)


One thing that may interest you is Epistemology: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epistemology

Oh, and you can't simply say philosophy and these thoughts have no purpose.  Just as you cannot say that video games have no purpose.

(This post was last modified: 02/06/2007 05:59 PM by ZiNgA BuRgA.)

@Ge64: saying stuff like that is basically saying "please rip into me"