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A comment on Universe would die before monkey with keyboard writes Shakespeare, study finds. Parent comment

Re:Universe would die before monkey with keyboard writes Sha... by thih9 on Friday November 01, 2024 @05:35AM (#42015313)
The paper doesn’t say that either. They only call the original theorem misleading. I understood that their point is the same as yours - that infinity won’t happen in a finite time period.

> The long-established result of the Infinite Monkeys Theorem is correct, but misleading.

> Non-trivial text generation during the lifespan of our universe is almost certainly impossible.

> The Finite Monkeys case shows there will never be sufficient resources to generate Shakespeare.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S277318632...

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Re:Universe would die before monkey with keyboard writes Sha... by chasd00 on Friday November 01, 2024 @01:01PM (#42019074)
I don’t see how the original is misleading. The word “infinite” isn’t hidden or anything… unless the definition of infinite is misleading but I think it’s use here is pretty clear.
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Re:Universe would die before monkey with keyboard writes Sha... by thih9 on Friday November 01, 2024 @02:28PM (#42020061)
“Infinity” on its own is clear, but in tandem with monkeys it could get confusing.

If you remember that a monkey here is also a theoretical construct then I guess all is fine. But otherwise monkeys need at least a universe to function and that is finite.

Perhaps it would have been seen as less confusing if it was a demon[1] that enters random letters instead.

[1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demon_(thought_experiment)

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