4 ms·
If no physical event is truly random, then perhaps all physically realizable one time pads are compressible and thus crackable, and perfect security in a physic
by yters 7y ago
If no physical event is truly random, then perhaps all physically realizable one time pads are compressible and thus crackable, and perfect security in a physical setting is impossible.
On the other hand, randomness is not the same as nondeterminism. We could have a specific infinitely long incompressible bitstring that is the source of randomness in our universe, but the bitstring is not changing, so it is deterministic. There would be no empirically distinguishable difference between this and an actual undetermined source of randomness.
And finally, what we call random and nonrandom is essentially an arbitrary choice based on a certain mechanism called a Turing machine. As Dilbert says the number 4 is a random number, and the only random number you need. It is unclear what makes compressible bitstrings special, although it is clear that they are rare. But why does observing a compressible bitstring demand an explanation? We could hypothesize reality is fed by an infinitely long bitstring which some parts are compressible and some parts incompressible. In fact, an infinite random bitstring is guaranteed to have arbitrarily long compressible subsequences, so we could explain any empirical observation of compression as being due to an infinite random bitstring and devoid of true explanation beyond itself.
- NateEag 7y agoIrrelevant nitpick: pretty sure you're thinking of XKCD, not Dilbert. https://www.xkcd.com/221/ https://www.xkcd.com/221/
- lordgrenville 7y agoNo, OP meant Dilbert. Here it is: https://dilbert.com/strip/2001-10-25 https://dilbert.com/strip/2001-10-25
- SAI_Peregrinus 7y agoYeah, Dilbert's (older) version of the joke uses 9.