RNGs predicting the future?

[ihgreenman]

For those of you who don't watch Slashdot.

Apparently, some random number generators can see into the future...If you've read "Margins Of Reality", this appears to be an adjunct/followup of this work. In a nutshell: We (humans) can influence random events, to a statistically significant degree. However, this effect is about 6 parts in one

Comments

Let's get one...

[scorched_mirth]

The only way I can think of to test this is to, well, test it. Anybody know where we can get an RNG of the type under test.

Here's the kicker:

[ihgreenman]

it doesn't matter.

The origional research was with getting people to have the RNGs deviate in a specific direction. They used reversed biased diodes (best random noise) hooked up to a/d converters, microphones (look at the least signifigant bit), coin flipping, and the little balls that fall down and form a bell shaped pattern.

Everybody was able to influence these things to some degree, and the degree/direction that they were able to influence things to depended upon the person, *not the RNG sampled.*

It even works with PRNGs, if you set up the sampling correctly. Yes, that's right. Pesudo Random Number Generators. Nothing physical at all; just an apparently random stream of numbers that you sample from occasionally.

Now with that said, I think I could build a reverse-biased diode to hook up to an a/d converter with parts that I have lying around.