LOGICal eMOTIONs

Monkey Diversity In Texas

// January 7th, 2009 // Brain Dump, Meme Posts

The infinite monkey theorem states that a monkey hitting keys at random on a typewriter keyboard for an infinite amount of time will almost surely type a given text, such as the complete works of William Shakespeare.

In this context, “almost surely” is a mathematical term with a precise meaning, and the “monkey” is not an actual monkey; rather, it is a metaphor for an abstract device that produces a random sequence of letters ad infinitum. The theorem illustrates the perils of reasoning about infinity by imagining a vast but finite number, and vice versa. The probability of a monkey typing a given string of text as long as, say, Hamlet, is so tiny that, were the experiment conducted, the chance of it actually occurring during a span of time of the order of the age of the universe is minuscule but not zero.

Ok, there is no Shakespeare (as far as I know), no monkeys, Bob is in Texas, probability of Bob reaching 100 submitters is high (not minuscule or zero), and no monkeys were harmed in the making of this blog post that promotes the 2nd ever BLOGAPOLOOZA over at Middle Zone Musings happening all month long. Want to participate? Read this and/or ping Bob by email or by Twitter. Oh, and yes, thanks to Wiki, we now know that the above image does not contain a monkey but a Chimpanzee, and Chimps should be regarded as apes and not monkeys.

P.S. My glorious post gets published today at 6pm!

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