At work the other day one of my co-workers needed some random numbers. He used www.random.org. I had never heard of the site so I checked it out. I have always been interested in random number generators since I read a descrete mathematics book, "Jungles of Randomness", back in university.
You see one chapter in the book proposed an idea that still intrigues me to this day. It states that truely random sequences of numbers simply do not exist. I apologize for not remembering the authors name or who actually make this statement. The reasoning tied to chaos theory. Chaos theory basicially states that seemingly random systems can produce effects that form patterns. This is a very very simplified explaination but it's what I understand it to be.
So when I checked out www.random.org I found that they generate their random numbers by using radio static. They have a radio tuned into a station that no one broadcasts on and from the static they claim to generate truely random numbers. They do this basically by converting the audio into a stream of bits and then run it through a skew algorithm to ensure a fairly homogeneous mixture of 0's and 1's.
What were my thoughts on this? Well, if you believe in chaos theory then can you also believe that there are truely random numbers? Radio static is a seemingly random system but chaos theory states that order can be derived from any seeminly random system. This leads me to conclude that the numbers from www.random.org are not truely random.
So are their any truely random numbers? Personally, I don't believe there are. Just because we don't understand how things interrelate doesn't mean that they don't. Not only do we not understand all things, we probably never will.
Well after those deep thoughts I think it's time for a beer. :p L8r!
I hope the beer helped! Those are some pretty deep contemplations! I used to only get that way when I was drinking; and only with this one particular person. We could go on for hours about the non-existance of space. Don't ask! ;) It was fun though... i think we need to stretch our minds on a regular basis, so they stay healthy. :)
If the number is random enough for practical or applied purposes (e.g. cryptography) then isn't it really random enough. I agree with your theory that there aren't REALLY any trully random numbers, deep stuff. Keep it coming!