Re: Generating Random Numbers with Normal Distribution

On Dec 10, 2007 5:29 PM, Robert Cummings <robert@interjinn.com> wrote: > On Mon, 2007-12-10 at 14:22 -0600, Jay Blanchard wrote: > > [snip] > > Can you say for certain nature is truly random? Just because the seed > > may have occurred 13.7 billion years ago and we don't know what that > > initial state was and we couldn't possibly calculate all the > > interactions since, doesn't mean that everything since hasn't been > > happening in accordance with some universal formula and in absence of > > randomness. We know that there appear to be certain laws in physics, > > would they not have applied to that initial state in a non random > > manner? It may just be that due to the hugantic sample space from which > > to draw arbitrary values that we think things are random. > > > > Food for thought :) > > [/snip] > > > > Without order there cannot be randomness. > > But is the reverse true? i would have to say randomness came before order. but i suppose thats a chicken and egg problem.. btw, i found this later today; http://us.php.net/manual/en/ref.stats.php there is a function in there for getting a random value from a normal distribution: stats_rand_gen_normal but it looks to be in pecl and i didnt see it in portage so i gave up on trying it out pretty quickly =/ -nathan