Does random have rules?

[LostLocke]

Which explains how you come to have crispy fried dumplings for brains.

If human brains were made out of crispy fried dumplings, I'd become a zombie in a heartbeat.

[Alex K]

Where does the lore come from that Zombies particularly prefer brains? I can remember no such thing from Night of the living dead, nor from Resident Evil

[watchamadoodle]

Where does the lore come from that Zombies particularly prefer brains? I can remember no such thing from Night of the living dead, nor from Resident Evil

I heard that zombies prefer the brains of scientists and other people who keep their brains toned. They don't like stringy brains like mine.

The 1981 film Hell of the Living Dead referenced a mutagenic gas as a source of zombie contagion: an idea also used in Dan O'Bannon's 1985 film Return of the Living Dead. Return of the Living Dead featured zombies that hungered specifically for brains.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zombie

[Alex K]

Perfect!

[robvalue]

I heard somewhere that the overall net behaviour of the quantum level can be predictable (zoomed out I guess) but the actual quantum randomness isn't. Is that right? But that doesn't sound right. Although you may well expect it to be predictable most of the time, if the quantum randomness truly is random, there has to be a chance it's not going to even itself out when all taken into account.

Brain malfunction #157 please consult manual

[Alex K]

Yes there's that chance, rob. But the probability to see a large fluctuation in the zoomed out average is very small, and the expected relative size of fluctuations goes like 1/sqrt(number of particles) or so, which for a few grams of material is like 10^-11

[robvalue]

I see. But given the huge number of "averaging out" events that must be going on all the time...

But I suppose even then it would get corrected pretty quickly so we wouldn't notice or something.

Ah, just smash everything up instead.

[Alex K]

I see. But given the huge number of "averaging out" events that must be going on all the time...

But I suppose even then it would get corrected pretty quickly so we wouldn't notice or something.

Ah, just smash everything up instead.

The 10^-11 is like the mean value of fluctuation size which you would see with probability ~ 1. If you want a much bigger fluctuation, the probability is exponentially suppressed. So if you want a fluctuation of relative size 1 (like a stone jumping up fron thermal energy, that probability is like p~ e^(-10^11) or something absurdly small like that.)

[robvalue]

Right, yeah. So you're saying it's 50/50 then because it can either happen or not? :p

Just kidding. Thanks for the insights

[watchamadoodle]

The 10^-11 is like the mean value of fluctuation size which you would see with probability ~ 1. If you want a much bigger fluctuation, the probability is exponentially suppressed. So if you want a fluctuation of relative size 1 (like a stone jumping up fron thermal energy, that probability is like p~ e^(-10^11) or something absurdly small like that.)

How often does the stone get to roll the dice?
I suppose it is once per second?
Also how many stones are there?
Maybe if everybody would spend their free time watching, we could catch a stone jumping and post it on the internet?