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Universe would die before monkey with keyboard writes Shakespeare, study finds

theguardian.com

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Re: Universe would die before monkey with keyboard writes Shakespeare, study finds

#101

Post by chasd00 »

I thought the saying was “infinite monkeys..” and in that case you would get the full works of Shakespeare immediately. With an infinite amount of time and one monkey you’d get the full works of Shakespeare in every language supported by the typewriter any number of times in a row you wished. In fact, you’d get anything you wanted as long as the probability was > 0

Edit: after walking my dogs, isn’t the probability of the full works of Shakespeare never being typed out also > 0? (I can’t believe I’m actually spending calories on this..)

Re: Universe would die before monkey with keyboard writes Shakespeare, study finds

#102

Post by netsharc »

Not the point of the article, but this got me curious...

> Shakespeare’s canon includes 884,647 words – none of them banana.

If this article (1) is accurate, Shakespeare never even knew what a banana is, and he never tried it, since he died ~2 decades before they came to England:

> England got its first glimpse of the banana when herbalist, botanist and merchant Thomas Johnson displayed a bunch in his shop in Holborn, in the City of London, on April 10, 1633.

(1) https://theconversation.com/the-day-bananas-made-their-briti...

Re: Universe would die before monkey with keyboard writes Shakespeare, study finds

#105

Post by jvanderbot »

ragnese wrote: post #95
Digory wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but the theorem is meant to explain what can happen in the universe over long time scales. The point is that there isn't enough time in the universe for all the random stuff to happen that scientists pin on random chance. The theorem was memorable, but a cop out.

> Yes, but the theorem is meant to explain what can happen in the universe over long time scales. I never understood it that way. I always interpreted it as a fun way to explain the mathematical truth that no matter how low a probability is, as long as it is technically above 0, the event it describes WILL eventually occur given enough time/trials/etc. I can't see anybody ever interpreting it as a statement about the…

Have you heard of a Boltman Brain? It's the kind of absurdity that happens when people think seriously about this in the real, actual universe.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boltzmann_brain

Re: Universe would die before monkey with keyboard writes Shakespeare, study finds

#106

Post by wang_li »

Aardwolf wrote: post #59

The theorem is called "infinite monkey theorem". That means infinite amount of time. A googol years is not infinite, it's infinite times smaller than that. In an infinite amount of time they will write Shakespeare works (if they type randomly enough and not with some bias like never typing certain combinations of letters) Also, at least the article could have said what the actual probability is then? Are we talking 1…

"Infinite monkeys" would produce Shakespeare and every other book, document, and all future possible book and document in the amount of time equal to the number of letters in the book and the typing rate of a monkey. It wouldn't take an infinite amount of time. :)

Re: Universe would die before monkey with keyboard writes Shakespeare, study finds

#107

Post by tombert »

kypro wrote: post #6
andrewstuart wrote: post #4

No-one ever said it would happen within a finite time period, only that it would happen given infinite time. That’s the whole point.

Yeah exactly, it's a thought experiment about infinities... Is someone going to publish a study concluding that Hilbert's Hotel couldn't be built on Earth too? Why are people even spending money on this research? What are they trying to prove/disprove?

It doesn't appear that they got any money for this, so I'm more forgiving of mathematicians just dicking around with something for fun.

Still, it's a very bizarre assertion to make; it's like they're trying to debunk something that no one claimed.

ETA:

Maybe they were trying to prevent the Mr Burns' of the world from trying to experiment: https://youtu.be/no_elVGGgW8

Re: Universe would die before monkey with keyboard writes Shakespeare, study finds

#108

Post by thom »

bluefirebrand wrote: post #97
thom wrote: post #80

What if something in monkey psychology causes them to hit the keyboard with their fist or palm every five minutes or so of typing? What if they regularly lapse into just pressing one key over and over? It seems very unlikely to me that even with infinite monkeys a work would be generated, because they're not actually random number generators.

If you had infinite monkies, what is the probability that one of them is actually a random number generator In the set of all infinite monkies there are infinite monkies that are random number generators

I believe that probability could plausibly be zero.

Re: Universe would die before monkey with keyboard writes Shakespeare, study finds

#109

Post by matt_kantor »

ribcage wrote: post #103

The universe would die of shame right now if it knew it's humans are spending their time questioning garbage like this.

Next someone will publish a study finding that spherical cows can't survive in the real world.

Re: Universe would die before monkey with keyboard writes Shakespeare, study finds

#110

Post by midiguy »

chasd00 wrote: post #101

I thought the saying was “infinite monkeys..” and in that case you would get the full works of Shakespeare immediately. With an infinite amount of time and one monkey you’d get the full works of Shakespeare in every language supported by the typewriter any number of times in a row you wished. In fact, you’d get anything you wanted as long as the probability was > 0 Edit: after walking my dogs, isn’t the probability o…

I'm picturing scientists in another universe clenching their butts as the monkey goes to type the last letter of Hamlet..... and misses 't' for 'r' and the whole observation hall erupts with loud groans
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