Is Randomness Real or Just Complex Predictability?

[travwg33]

Just to help define what random is Dictionary.com states that it is:

"–adjective
1. proceeding, made, or occurring without definite aim, reason, or pattern: the random selection of numbers."

But does random truly exist?
For example the roll of dice is usually referred to as random, but really there are tons of factors that control the result of a roll. Air resistance, friction for the surface the dice land on, how the dice are thrown, their starting position, etc...
In the game of craps, there are people who can actually change the probability of rolling certain combinations of numbers; obviously they are tampering with the factors to change the result.

Is random merely a term dubbed for scenarios too complex for us to break down and predict, or does random exist?

 

[wuliheron]

That is really a metaphysical question rather than an issue for physics. Being metaphysical there is also no way to prove the issue one way or another. For all we know everything is ultimately utterly random or perfectly orderly, but there is no way to prove the issue either way. The best we can do is report what we observe.

That being the case, what we observe is that the random and orderly seem to go together and, for all we know, the two are relative. That is, what looks random to one person might look orderly to another and the two might actually be inseperable opposites like "up" and "down" that have no meaning as absolutes. The reality that they describe could even be something that is simply beyond human comprehension.

 

[Pythagorean]

If you're talking about dice and probability, you're talking about this kind of random:

All outcomes being unpredictable and, in the ideal case, equally probable; resulting from such selection; lacking statistical correlation

I think it's an ideal that most probably doesn't exist, but can be approximated very well in certain situations (coin/dice toss)

 

[JoeDawg]

Is random merely a term dubbed for scenarios too complex for us to break down and predict, or does random exist?

Random, generally, can mean one of two things:
1)Unpredictable, from a given point of view.
2)Uncaused, by a previous event.

The first one is easy, random in this sense is just a description based on either a simple lack of knowledge or the impossiblity of having enough knowledge. The former being like predicting what your girlfriend will wear, whereas the latter is like predicting the weather.

The second refers to an actual event that has no preceding cause. Whether this can exist is an open question, and even if they do exist, it would be unlikely that one could distinguish it from something that is simply unpredictable.

 

[jgm340]

I like this definition of random: "a behavior for which we cannot determine the cause".

In mathematics, the study of probability is the study of a function without knowing anything about the domain.

 

[Ken Natton]

I make no comment on any philosophical notion of what is truly 'random' but in the purely practical world of computing, genuinely random numbers are notoriuosly difficult to generate. Computers usually generate 'random' numbers by seeding a pre-written numeric sequence.

But I do remember reading a description of some really convoluted setup that involved vertical transparent tubes filled with some fluid in which was suspended some microbiological life form. This life form created constantly shifting opacity in the fluid. Light was then shone through the tube and any light that made it through was detected and used to generate random binary numbers. It was reckoned that was the closest anyone had come to genuinely random number generation.

Don't know if that is what you were looking for.

 

[wuliheron]

There are commercially available quantum random number generators you can buy for computers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hardware_random_number_generator

 

[hagopbul]

yes i believe so

 

[wuliheron]

To believe in the truly random is to believe in the supernatural. By definition the supernatural is "beyond natural law".

 

[Evo]

To believe in the truly random is to believe in the supernatural.

Why? Please back that up.

 

[wuliheron]

Any dictionary will do the trick:

Supernatural
adjective
1. of, pertaining to, or being above or beyond what is natural; unexplainable by natural law or phenomena; abnormal.

 

[Evo]

Any dictionary will do the trick:

No, that's not what I asked. I asked you to explain how random = supernatural. Please explain.

 

[Newai]

Assume the circumstances in the environment and all influences can be reproduced down to the atomic scale in the roll of a die. In this case, the exact motion and direction of a hand, from the speed of the swing to the exact same point of release, is duplicated exactly, as well as all other influences. Will the die produce without fail the same result?

 

[Fuzzystuff]

When something is random, it is unexpected. You cannot expect what number will be next out of a random selection of a million numbers, for instance, especially if you don't know how the generator works. Not necessarily abnormal, though. "Random" stuff happens all day long. We use the potential of random for many risk assessments such as your commute to work, your financial budget, your goal setting dates, etc. All of them use "what could happen". You don't know for sure if it's going to happen or not, so this is "random" to you. I really don't think the unexpected is abnormal, but pretty normal in our day to day lives. This is why we go to work early, have an emergency fund, and add in the possible roadblocks to our goals.

Supernatural is supernatural, random is random. The only inter-relationship I can see is that you cannot explain how the generator chose it's number, if you have no clue how the generator is choosing it's number.

There is also the quanta world and below Planck length that is seemingly random to us humans, and in fact we can only apply "potentials" or "probabilities" to some aspects of quantum physics.

Random is either 2 things in my eyes:

a. Not enough information supplied to come to a concrete prediction.
b. Not possible to gain enough information to come to a concrete prediction.

The former is easy, while the latter assumes that we cannot gain all of the information necessary to make the prediction absolutely concrete. Only potentials and probabilities of said prediction coming true.

There is the measurement problem and also the uncertainty principle in physics, too.

 

[Fuzzystuff]

Assume the circumstances in the environment and all influences can be reproduced down to the atomic scale in the roll of a die. In this case, the exact motion and direction of a hand, from the speed of the swing to the exact same point of release, is duplicated exactly, as well as all other influences. Will the die produce without fail the same result?

No single event happens the exact same way twice. It's practically impossible and may be intrinsically in nature to be impossible. So even theoretically speaking, it may be impossible to have the same event happen identically the same way twice or more.

 

[wuliheron]

No, that's not what I asked. I asked you to explain how random = supernatural. Please explain.

If you really insist I will post the definitions of both words, however, I shall try to explain without resorting to such crude methods.

In general westerners tend to think of the "supernatural" as involving rituals, deities, etc., but this is certainly not the only way of thinking of the concept. It is more of a cultural predjudice than anything else. In the strictest sense the supernatural is simply anything that does not obey natural laws which includes anything truly random. For example, virtual particles appear and disappear out of the vacuum of space without any known causal agent. They apparently do so randomly without any rhyme or reason, thus being beyond natural law.

 

[Newai]

No single event happens the exact same way twice. It's practically impossible and may be intrinsically in nature to be impossible. So even theoretically speaking, it may be impossible to have the same event happen identically the same way twice or more.

Okay, so what makes the second throw in the duplicated circumstances and environment different from the first? What causes the different result?

 

[Evo]

If you really insist I will post the definitions of both words, however, I shall try to explain without resorting to such crude methods.

In general westerners tend to think of the "supernatural" as involving rituals, deities, etc., but this is certainly not the only way of thinking of the concept. It is more of a cultural predjudice than anything else. In the strictest sense the supernatural is simply anything that does not obey natural laws which includes anything truly random.

What makes you think something random is not obeying natural laws?

For example, virtual particles appear and disappear out of the vacuum of space without any known causal agent. They apparently do so randomly without any rhyme or reason, thus being beyond natural law.

Bolding mine. And how did you come to this conclusion?

 

[wuliheron]

What makes you think something random is not obeying natural laws?

Bolding mine. And how did you come to this conclusion?

If you really insist:

Law
noun
1. the principles and regulations established in a community by some authority and applicable to its people, whether in the form of legislation or of custom and policies recognized and enforced by judicial decision.
2. any written or positive rule or collection of rules prescribed under the authority of the state or nation, as by the people in its constitution. Compare bylaw, statute law.
3. the controlling influence of such rules; the condition of society brought about by their observance: maintaining law and order.
4. a system or collection of such rules.

The idea of a "random" law is an oxymoron.

 

[Fuzzystuff]

Okay, so what makes the second throw in the duplicated circumstances and environment different from the first? What causes the different result?

The uncertainty principle states that the more we know of an object's velocity, the less we know of the object's position and vice-versa. This is nature unrelenting to fully reveal herself to us. This is also not the researches fault, but is intrinsic in quantum mechanics. It also states that any vector we use to measure will have this same issue. There are also vibrations at the quanta level, beyond the point of anything meaningful or measurable, that can add up from chaos theory to prevent us from duplicating the event twice or more.

Basically, you would have to be all knowing and all seeing to be able to measure the event. Then you would have to be Godlike in precision to duplicate the event exactly as it was the first time, which even then it may be impossible to do. It may be intrinsic in nature not to allow us to duplicate an event's outcome identical to the first, second or third time doing it. The best we have is the probability of the outcome, no matter how many times we run the experiment.

 

[Fuzzystuff]

If you really insist:



The idea of a "random" law is an oxymoron.

You're presupposing random is real, when the question of this thread is if it's real or not.

 

[Evo]

If you really insist:



The idea of a "random" law is an oxymoron.

Once again you avoided answering my question. What makes random = supernatural. Please explain and not evade answering.

 

[wuliheron]

Once again you avoided answering my question. What makes random = supernatural. Please explain and not evade answering.

I am answering the question as directly as I can. Neither the random nor the supernatural obey any laws. I could extrapolate further and go into detail about how any such metaphysical statement has no demonstrable meaning outside of specific contexts or how many cultures see the two as one and the same phenomena, but that would be to digress.

 

[Evo]

I am answering the question as directly as I can. Neither the random nor the supernatural obey any laws.

And how exactly do you know random occurences do not follow laws? I'm eating and a piece of food falls out of my mouth onto the floor. It's a random occurence, following the laws of gravity.

 

[KalamMekhar]

Predict me an accurate 10th day forecast, and you will have solved the randomness of weather systems. Predicting weather is essentially impossible for anything longer than 5 days, because of the randomness of weather systems.

 

[jostpuur]

To believe in the truly random is to believe in the supernatural. By definition the supernatural is "beyond natural law".

Why? Please back that up.

wuliheron said that because his/her intuition says that truly random is supernatural. Doesn't look a big deal to me.

Evo, if your intuition says the opposite. Can you "back up" your opinion?

These are kind of topics where you must rely on intuition and not logic, because it's impossible to come up with rigor definitions for the concepts. It's pretty difficult to justify anything properly.

I'm eating and a piece of food falls out of my mouth onto the floor. It's a random occurence, following the laws of gravity.

There is no reason to assume that an accidental slip with a piece of food is an example of a truly random event. This is not related to wuliheron's original claim.

 

[Fuzzystuff]

This conversation is about to turn silly real fast. Let's suppose that the conditions that lead to the bit of food that fell out of your mouth and onto the floor were mostly due to your precision of eating. If you are a sloppy eater, the more frequent the occurrence of food falling out of your mouth will be over a period of time. How sloppy can a person be at eating food? Does the chance that the person eats so sloppy that you can literally predict that food will fall out of his mouth mean it is random? No.. it doesn't. How do you know the person's eating habits are sloppy, so sloppy that you can predict to let's say, 99.99% certainty that he will indeed drop food out of his mouth. You would have to observe. And observe. Your whole life would be devoted to watching this dude eat food, just to make sure that food dropping out of his mouth isn't a random occurrence.

Now before I flip the coin note I said 99.99% chance. Why not just plain old 100%?

Let's flip the coin now and say that the chance of a very professional eater has of food dropping out of his mouth is slim to none. Sure, it's possible. A gust of wind could cause food to blow out of the mouth, or a twitch in the nervous system, but let's say we have perfect conditions and environment for this professional eater. The dude (pro food eater) is in a vacuum, no light being shone on him, nothing that could possibly interfere with him eating food. (Before I go on.. What are some of the issues arising here? He would have to have a perfect nervous system and body system under the effects of the quanta. He would have to be able to be a perfect eater in the complete dark. He would also still be under the effects of gravity, not to mention quantum entanglement, even if we put him in complete space and he was able to be a perfect eater in 0 gravity. Virtual particles would come into play as a potential for a crumble.) He would have to be in a state where we can't even measure the dude to make sure that he has 100% chance of not dropping food out of his mouth, giving that food crumbling out of his mouth would be an utterly, unexpected, unaccounted for random occurrence.

To end, my conjecture is that that we'll never really know if random is real or not. The measurements needed to observe the randomness wouldn't be possible, and if they were possible, it would be in the wave function of the particles associated with the randomness. I beg the question then, what's up with parallel universes? :p

 

[Evo]

wuliheron said that because his/her intuition says that truly random is supernatural. Doesn't look a big deal to me.

Evo, if your intuition says the opposite. Can you "back up" your opinion?

Don't have to, he/she made the claim, the onus is on him/her to back that up.

 

[DrRocket]

I like this definition of random: "a behavior for which we cannot determine the cause".

In mathematics, the study of probability is the study of a function without knowing anything about the domain.

No, it is not.

In mathematics probability theory is a subset of the general theory of measure and integration. That is one of Kolmogorov's major contributions to mathematics. The domain is clearly defined, and it is what is called a probability space. A random variable is simply a measurable function defined on that probability space.

There is no good mathematical definition for "random" beyond that.

 

[Pythagorean]

There's a lot of subjectivity in the popular definition. I haven't thought about random like this for a little less than a decade. Let's take a internet poll:

i) wikipedia.com:
Randomness is a concept with somewhat disparate meanings in several fields. It also has common meanings which may have loose connections with some of those more definite meanings

ii) wordlnetweb.princeton.edu:
lacking any definite plan or order or purpose; governed by or depending on chance; "a random choice"; "bombs fell at random"; "random movements"

iii) webster.com:
having the quality of being a remarkable coincidence

From i) the first bit of subjectivity comes from our individual connotations of the word.

Definition ii) and iii) are similar to the OP's definition, which seems to be a statement about causation. In this regard, I can see what wuliheron is trying to say (something about ignorance about causation being common between seemingly random events and supernatural events, which both have definition that are rooted in a lack of causation). I wouldn't have chosen the comparison, myself because individual notions of the word supernatural will just confuse the picture more.)

Anyway, my point is that this popular definition of random makes it a subjective device. It doesn't point to a particular lack of causation, so much as a lack of knowledge of causation. In that regard, as a state of mind, it does exist. Whereas the supernatural, which is more objectively defined, does not seem to exist.

Unless, of course, the fundamental question is supposed to about the lack of causation itself. Did the OP mean, "Do all events have a cause?"

 

[wuliheron]

Obviously I can no more prove that something is truly random than I can prove an undetectable pixie sits on my left shoulder. Again, this is a metaphysical issue which is by definition beyond the ability of science to prove one way or another. Nor should it be within the purview of science, in my opinion, which has more productive matters issues to attend to.

However, what science can address is the definition of terms including "random" and "supernatural". These, I assert, only have demonstrable meaning according to their function in a given context. When the context becomes so broad as to include life, the universe, and everything there is no demonstrable difference between the random and supernatural. Both are said to not obey natural law.

 

[DrRocket]

Obviously I can no more prove that something is truly random than I can prove an undetectable pixie sits on my left shoulder. Again, this is a metaphysical issue which is by definition beyond the ability of science to prove one way or another. Nor should it be within the purview of science, in my opinion, which more productive matters issues to attend to.

However, what science can address is the definition of terms including "random" and "supernatural". These, I assert, only have demonstrable meaning according to their function in a given context. When the context becomes so broad as to include life, universe, and everything there is no demonstrable difference between the random and supernatural.

In order for you to prove that sometning is truly random, you would need a solid mathematical definition of what is meant by "random". Lacking that there is no possibility of a proof.

 

[Pythagorean]

In order for you to prove that sometning is truly random, you would need a solid mathematical definition of what is meant by "random". Lacking that there is no possibility of a proof.

In an earlier post, I brought up the definition that refers to a situation in which all events are equally probable, then all events are random (even in the causative perspective) I think this is mathematically rigorous enough as a definition. I also tend to think it's highly unlikely that any real system has a chance of all it's states being equally probable because real systems can't be perfectly isolated from perturbation and entropy.

That's not say we can't well approximate it for our purposes. Dice and coins are the popular examples. If you do an experiment with a coin, and you do a lot of trials, you will find about a 50/50 split. But there's always error. What if you have a habit of always starting the coins head up, and you've flipped a coin so many times your muscles are more likely to put eight flips into the coin than any other number of flips, etc, etc. These irregularities in the statistics are causative factors. True randomness, a lack of cause, would mean the coin truly had no destiny to land heads up or tails up.

In physics, there's one particular behavior I can think of that has no known cause and happens in a statistically consistent way regardless of conditions:

atom decay

people are still arguing over whether it's truly random (has no cause) or not.

 

[jostpuur]

However, what science can address is the definition of terms including "random" and "supernatural".

So you believe that you have a definition for what "random" actually means?

(So rigor definition, that it can be used to deal with these claims about randomness being supernatural.)

 

[jostpuur]

In an earlier post, I brought up the definition that refers to a situation in which all events are equally probable, then all events are random (even in the causative perspective) I think this is mathematically rigorous enough as a definition.

Defining the concept of randomness by using the concept of probability is not the most satisfying strategy for finding a definition

 

[disregardthat]

In an earlier post, I brought up the definition that refers to a situation in which all events are equally probable, then all events are random (even in the causative perspective) I think this is mathematically rigorous enough as a definition. I also tend to think it's highly unlikely that any real system has a chance of all it's states being equally probable because real systems can't be perfectly isolated from perturbation and entropy.

Why does it have to be equally probable? Suppose you are throwing a dice with 5 blue and 1 red side. Is not the outcome (side facing up) random even though it is 5 times more probable that the red side faces up?

Probability in common language is always used when we lack the ability to predict. So if something is 'really' random, does that mean it is impossible to predict, no matter what information you have? I can easily imagine that we can come up with a sort of event for which there are quantum mechanical principles which disallows us to collect the necessary amount of information to predict. But does this mean the event was 'really' random?

It's important to distinguish between 'true' causality, 'true' randomness, and just causality and randomness in models. If a phenomenon was 'really random', but behaved according to certain tendencies, we can have causal models of it (e.g. thermodynamics, given that microscopic movement is 'truly' random). And the other way, if a phenomenon is causal, we can just as well have probabilistic theories of it. Any pseudo-random phenomenon is an example of this.

So models cannot determine whether a phenomenon is 'truly' random or 'truly' causal, and I suggest that these as intrinsic properties does not even make sense. When we speak of a phenomenon, we are not merely labeling observations, we are extracting generality from individual observations. The generality extracted is a way of thinking of the phenomenon, and it is in this way of thinking terms like causal and random really make sense, and these terms are only meaningful in the sense of our ability to predict. So it is meaningless to apply these terms as intrinsic to examples of phenomena in themselves. Does this not become a question of our own ability to think of phenomena? I believe Kant argued that causality is one of our cognitive categories in which we interpret all sensory experience.

EDIT: Oh, look; this is my 777'th post. How random.

 

[russ_watters]

You're presupposing random is real, when the question of this thread is if it's real or not.

Well I'll answer that simply: random is real [sic], as far as we know. It is not a difficult question, scientifically. Much of QM is dependent on probability, behaving exactly like that dice throw.

Regarding random vs supernatural, Evo is right that she doesn't have to back up a counter to a claim that someone else made - they have to back up their claim. However, for expedience: The existence of randomness in nature does not violate physical laws, so there is no need for every random event to be considered supernatural. The proposed contradiction between "random" and "law" does not exist.

And note, repeating a throw of a die is not just a technical impossibility (I'm assuming we're not just dropping it from a height of 1" here...), but it is in fact a physical impossibility. Getting the initial conditions exactly equal every time would be a violation of physical law because the concept of "exact" violates QM.

This isn't a philosophical question, it is a scientific question and it really isn't all that difficult of a question.

 

[russ_watters]

Why does it have to be equally probable? Suppose you are throwing a dice with 5 blue and 1 red side. Is not the outcome (side facing up) random even though it is 5 times more probable that the red side faces up?

Probability in common language is always used when we lack the ability to predict.

Correct. People tend to mistake probability and randomness. That may be part of the motivation for this thread.

The fact that you can roll a die a large number of times and get a 1, 1/6 of the time does not make the roll non-random: you have no ability to predict the outcome of an individual roll greater than 1/6 of the time.

 

[russ_watters]

Some of you may find this site instructional: http://www.random.org/randomness/

It covers basically the entirety of this issue.

 

[TubbaBlubba]

I see random as something fundamentally unpredictable, that with any given a priori knowledge, one can impossibly determine the result (e.g. the position of an electron).

 

[disregardthat]

I see random as something fundamentally unpredictable, that with any given a priori knowledge, one can impossibly determine the result (e.g. the position of an electron).

There are many events which we cannot possibly determine the results of (even in principle), but for which it is entirely possible that is caused by prior events. Furthermore, we have a good ability to predict random events as well to a high accuracy. And even predictions of causal events is only up to a certain degree of accuracy anyway. The 'ability to predict' criterion is not well-defined, and is not a satisfactory criterion to establish true randomness (not to mention the impossibility of establishing that it is true for any event in practice). It is entirely plausible that we will one day find a deterministic model of the electron (and accounts for behavior on the quantum level), but which deals in other terms than today.

As to problems such as predicting of the position of the electron; consider the following analogy: What is the position of a platoon of soldiers? How accurately can we measure it in space? Do you agree that it does not entirely make sense to consider the 'position of a platoon of a battalion of soldiers' as a point in space? But even so, it does make sense to consider the position as a 0-dimensional point on the map (and so also in space) for a military tactician.

The point is that we only speak in terms of our models (e.g. a map) of nature, not of the terms of nature itself (such terms cannot exist). The 'position of the platoon' is of course not a random event, but cannot either be measured to an exact accuracy. So, a questions such as the 'true' position of the electron does not necessarily make any sense as a sort of exact position which only can be measured to a certain degree of accuracy. Hence does the complete prediction of the position make as little sense. (The analogy goes further; as the platoon is advancing it is more spread out, so you can have the position to an even less 'degree of accuracy'.)

In fact, I would argue that no claim whatsoever of nature could be true 'intrinsically' to nature for the same reason, but I won't pursue that here..

 

[DrRocket]

In an earlier post, I brought up the definition that refers to a situation in which all events are equally probable, then all events are random (even in the causative perspective) I think this is mathematically rigorous enough as a definition. not.

Nope.

First, it is not a definition of "random" but rather a definition of "uniformly distributed". Uniform distribution is a potential attribute of a random variable, but says nothing whatever about the definition of random.

There are other distributions besides the uniform distribution and in many situations a uniform distribution is impossible.

Mathematics avoids actually defining the term "random" and a "random variable" is nothing more and nothing less than a measurable function defined on a probability space. In turn a probability space is simply a set with a sigma algebra of subsets and a positive measure that measures the whole space as 1. So, you see therein lies no useful test for "randomness".

Thus you still need a viable definition for "random".

 

[Pythagorean]

This was from wiktionary, which is hardly a reliable source, but it is fundamentally speaking about causality, which is more physical than mathematical:

Having unpredictable outcomes and, in the ideal case, all outcomes equally probable; resulting from such selection; lacking statistical correlation.

Here's what wolfram, a more reliable source, says about random numbers (i.e. random in mathematics):

A random number is a number chosen as if by chance from some specified distribution such that selection of a large set of these numbers reproduces the underlying distribution. Almost always, such numbers are also required to be independent, so that there are no correlations between successive numbers. Computer-generated random numbers are sometimes called pseudorandom numbers, while the term "random" is reserved for the output of unpredictable physical processes. When used without qualification, the word "random" usually means "random with a uniform distribution." Other distributions are of course possible. For example, the Box-Muller transformation allows pairs of uniform random numbers to be transformed to corresponding random numbers having a two-dimensional normal distribution.

So my definition is not completely off-base, but I think the first sentence is even more rigorous a definition.

Why does it have to be equally probable? Suppose you are throwing a dice with 5 blue and 1 red side. Is not the outcome (side facing up) random even though it is 5 times more probable that the red side faces up?

but you're kind of playing games, you're not confront the causality. If it was a truly random system, than each of the six sides would have equal probability of coming up. In that case, you would know exactly why blue is more probable than red (because it's a truly random die and more sides are painted blue than red). The randomness still only exists in the equal distribution of the probability of the faces turning up themselves. The distribution of colors in your system is no longer random (remember? you made blue more probable than red so they're not equally probable), but which face turns up still is.

the fact that you can roll a die a large number of times and get a 1, 1/6 of the time does not make the roll non-random: you have no ability to predict the outcome of an individual roll greater than 1/6 of the time.

I don't think anyone implied that. It depends, of course, what definition of random you're operating under, but the reason dice are non-random is because they're chaotic. A dice roll is classically deterministic, it just has a lot of figures to fiddle with in four dimensional variable space and n dimensional parameter space.

I'm still not sure though, whether your definition of random pertains to unpredictability of lack of causation. When I say that outcomes are equally probable, I mean fundamentally lack causation.

also, from your link:

When discussing single numbers, a random number is one that is drawn from a set of possible values, each of which is equally probable, i.e., a uniform distribution. When discussing a sequence of random numbers, each number drawn must be statistically independent of the others.

 

[disregardthat]

but you're kind of playing games, you're not confront the causality. If it was a truly random system, than each of the six sides would have equal probability of coming up. In that case, you would know exactly why blue is more probable than red (because it's a truly random die and more sides are painted blue than red). The randomness still only exists in the equal distribution of the probability of the faces turning up themselves. The distribution of colors in your system is no longer random (remember? you made blue more probable than red so they're not equally probable), but which face turns up still is.

You must not confuse the information of the system with the information of the results. In my example we still have no information whatsoever what the result will be. The point is that it is a random process. It is still random, even though the distribution is not uniform.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I understand the reference to supernatural and I think it is applicable. I have made arguments related to this idea before. Part of the problem is the interpretation of the word. As has been mentioned, "supernatural" is often associated with specific concepts like God, ghosts, or magic. But those concepts are really secondary to the definition. We assume that a God would be supernatural, but the word supernatural is not limited to the concept of a God.

Again here are the primary definitions. from several sources.

Of or relating to existence outside the natural world.
Attributed to a power that seems to violate or go beyond natural forces.
http://education.yahoo.com/reference/dictionary/entry/supernatural [American Heritage]

1 : of or relating to an order of existence beyond the visible observable universe; especially : of or relating to God or a god, demigod, spirit, or devil
2 a : departing from what is usual or normal especially so as to appear to transcend the laws of nature b : attributed to an invisible agent (as a ghost or spirit)
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/supernatural

supernatural adjective /ˌsuː.pəˈnætʃ.ər.əl//-pɚˈnætʃ.ɚ-/ adj
caused by forces that cannot be explained by science
http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/british/supernatural

1.existing or occurring outside the normal experience or knowledge of man; not explainable by the known forces or laws of nature; specif., of, involving, or attributed to God or a god
http://www.yourdictionary.com/supernatural [Webster New World]

To say that true randomness is supernatural, is only to say that any underlying process eludes description. It is beyond the ablity of science to describe it. It is simply a matter of definition.

By definition, events in a truly random system could not be predicted; they defy description, so truly random systems would qualify as being supernatural.

 

[Pythagorean]

You must not confuse the information of the system with the information of the results. In my example we still have no information whatsoever what the result will be. The point is that it is a random process. It is still random, even though the distribution is not uniform.

So then you're talking about a definition of random that only pertains to your subjective state of knowledge. This is what I would call something "appearing random". I covered this definition already. I'm talking about the causality. You seem to be talking about predictability.

 

[Evo]

the random and supernatural. Both are said to not obey natural law.

Where have you provided proof of this? Things can happen randomly while obeying all laws of nature. I understand if your belief is that nothing is random. But making such a claim needs backing up.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Since I believe that anything real can ultimately be described by science, I maintain that the word supernatural has no meaning. It is an arbitrary concept used to dismiss concepts subjectively defined not to be real.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Things can happen randomly while obeying all laws of nature. .

Name one.

 

[disregardthat]

So then you're talking about a definition of random that only pertains to your subjective state of knowledge. This is what I would call something "appearing random". I covered this definition already. I'm talking about the causality. You seem to be talking about predictability.

It must be some counter-intuitive definition of randomness if my suggestion is not an example of a random event. I don't agree with it. It certainly does not just "appear to be random", thus confusing it with such things as pseudo-randomness which also appears to be random. At best it's bad wording.