Infinite time is undefined though. We are not sure there was time before the Big Bang. Before anyone says “but there must have been,” consider that it’s just as paradoxical and mind blowing to imagine that time never had a beginning and just stretches infinitely into the past. How can that be so? It means it would have taken an infinite amount of time for us to reach this moment in time, and that means we never would have.
Lifetime of the universe is infinitely less than infinite time. So they solved for the wrong problem. Of course it may take longer than the life of the universe, or it may happen in a year. That’s the whole point of the concepts of infinity and true randomness. Once you put a limit on time or a restriction on randomness, then the thought experiment is broken. You’ve totally changed the equation.
I feel like there has to be more to this problem than pure probability. We ought to consider practical nuances like the tendency to randomly mash keys that are closer together rather than assume a uniform distribution.
Doesn’t matter in the real infinite monkeys thought experiment. The chance of an infinite number of monkeys at an infinite number of typewriters producing Shakespeare is 100%. That’s how infinity works.
This article fundamentally misunderstands the entire thought experiment by using finite monkeys. With infinite monkeys, we’d have the script as quickly as it is physically possible to type the script.
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This is clownery, humanity is infinite monkeys, and we wrote Hamlet ages ago.
Everyone keeps forgetting that we’re all just what monkeys evolved into…
Are they arguing it wasn’t random though? I mean Shakespeare had to think through the plot and everything, not just scribble nonsense on a page
The theorem holds true. The theorem states that the monkey has infinite time, not just the lifetime of our universe.
That’s just lazy science to change the conditions to make sensational headlines. Bad scientists!
This just in: scientists disprove validity of thought experiment; philosophers remain concerned that they’ve missed the point.
The universe is the cage and we are the monkeys. We have already written Hamlet.
Infinite time is undefined though. We are not sure there was time before the Big Bang. Before anyone says “but there must have been,” consider that it’s just as paradoxical and mind blowing to imagine that time never had a beginning and just stretches infinitely into the past. How can that be so? It means it would have taken an infinite amount of time for us to reach this moment in time, and that means we never would have.
Are spelling and punctuation expected to be accurate?
Infinity sorts it out for you, Karl
It was the best of times, it was the blurst of times??
You stupid monkey!
An ape could though.
Let’s use our braincells to fix real problems first. Like pants that don’t stretch.
Strong entry for an Ig Nobel Prize if nothing else.
Lifetime of the universe is infinitely less than infinite time. So they solved for the wrong problem. Of course it may take longer than the life of the universe, or it may happen in a year. That’s the whole point of the concepts of infinity and true randomness. Once you put a limit on time or a restriction on randomness, then the thought experiment is broken. You’ve totally changed the equation.
Yeah, that’s why we need at least… two of them.
the paper used the entire population (200 thousand) and would take some 10 ^ 10 ^ 7 heat deaths of the universe
I feel like there has to be more to this problem than pure probability. We ought to consider practical nuances like the tendency to randomly mash keys that are closer together rather than assume a uniform distribution.
Doesn’t matter in the real infinite monkeys thought experiment. The chance of an infinite number of monkeys at an infinite number of typewriters producing Shakespeare is 100%. That’s how infinity works.
Sure, but this time I thought these things might matter because the article gives a deadline - the end of the universe.
This article fundamentally misunderstands the entire thought experiment by using finite monkeys. With infinite monkeys, we’d have the script as quickly as it is physically possible to type the script.
Duh.
Use infinite monkeys.
But… we already did it?
Not with a typewriter, though.
Their assumptions must be wrong. They do not account for the most basic principle of the universe, “the show must go on.”