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nitpick: There is no such thing as a truly random piece of data. "Truly random" is only meaningful in the limit as the file size goes to infinity. The string "0
by lurker14 14y ago
nitpick: There is no such thing as a truly random piece of data. "Truly random" is only meaningful in the limit as the file size goes to infinity. The string "000000" could be generated by a truly random process just as well as any any other.
- bradleyjg 14y agoI meant Kolmogorov randomness which is defined via incompressibility.
- lurker14 14y agoFair enough, but Kolmogorov randomness is an existence concept, not a constructive concept, so I find it weird to talk about having such a string in this case where a real person sets about to generate a concrete file. Can you generate a Kolmogorov random file on your particular Unix system? That requires specifying what "your Unix system" rather rigorously, which seems unpleasant.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]