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From: ags@pucc-h (Dave Seaman)
Newsgroups: net.puzzle
Subject: Re: random number wanted between neg inf and pos inf
Message-ID: <2536@pucc-h>
Date: Fri, 27-Dec-85 10:03:22 EST
Article-I.D.: pucc-h.2536
Posted: Fri Dec 27 10:03:22 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 28-Dec-85 01:49:33 EST
References: <33@decwrl.UUCP> <2492@glacier.ARPA>
Reply-To: ags@pucc-h.UUCP (Dave Seaman)
Organization: Purdue University Computing Center
Lines: 29

In article <2492@glacier.ARPA> bhayes@glacier.UUCP (Barry Hayes) writes:
>It may not make sense to talk about "choosing randomly" one of
>an infinite number of possibilities.  Just watch...

Of course it makes sense to "choose randomly" one of an infinite number
of possibilities.  You seem to think that "choose randomly" means
"choose in such a way that all choices are equally likely," which
is another matter entirely.

>The distribution of the chips is as follows:
>Chip numbers     how many
>1/2              1
>2/3              2
>3/4              4
>4/5              8
>and so on
>
>I calculate the odds as follows:

Your calculation depends on the assumption that all chips are equally likely
to be chosen.  Very well:  what is the probability (p) that the 1/2 chip
will be chosen?  Whatever this probability is, the same probability must
apply to all the other chips, with the sum of all the probabilities being
one.  A moment's thought shows you cannot do it.

There are infinitely many ways to assign probabilities to this sample space,
but none of them are uniform.
-- 
Dave Seaman	  					pur-ee!pucc-h!ags