The Infinite Monkey Theorem

I know, I know. The name sounds incredibly made up. It is made up, isn't it? Everything humans use to communicate with each other is made up.

Well then, it is a made up theory. Just, I didn't make it.

Simply put, the Infinite Monkey Theorem states that if you let an immortal monkey hit keys on a typewriter keyboard for an infinite period of time, the monkey will be able to type out the entire works of Shakespeare, along with all pieces of literature of the past, present and future, an infinite number of times.

Creation!

French mathematician Émile Borel is credited with popularizing a similar concept in 1913, although some people attribute the original idea to Aristotle.

Émile Borel

Under the same conditions as before, Borel wanted to calculate the probability of the monkey typing a specific sentence. He said that the chances of the monkey typing the sentence in a finite amount of time is extremely small, but it becomes possible if the monkey continues typing indefinitely.

Connection to Entropy?!

It sounds scary, but simply put, entropy is the measure of disorder or randomness in a system. The more random something is, the higher the entropy. For example, the OnlyRedHerrings posting schedule must have staggering entropy (I promise I'm working on it).

The monkey's random typing has high entropy, because the monkey is probably illiterate, and not acquainted with Hamlet. The initial text is ideally nonsensical, so the probability of any real information being conveyed is minimal.

However, as time goes on, entropy decreases as the chance of producing meaningful text increases. Eventually, the monkey may type a word, and then a sentence, and finally the Hamlet.

So in this analogy, entropy decreases with increase in time. Information conveyed increases with decrease in entropy.

The Infinite Monkey Theorem helps to bridge the gap between randomness, entropy, time and the creation of meaningful patterns.

It's rather poetic in a way.

Actual Monkeys

In 2002, students from the University of Plymouth left a real computer keyboard in an enclosure of six Celebes crested macaques for almost two months.

Future Shakespeare

To quote the Atlanta Journal:

Give six monkeys a computer for a month and they will make a mess.

The monkeys produced a grand total of five pages, with most of them comprising of the letter 'S', with 'A', 'J', 'L' and 'M' giving guest appearances toward the end. The lead male brought a stone, and started bashing the keyboard, while the others were more invested in defecating and urinating on it.

Apparently English is not their forte.

-BracketRocket

Comments

sushiOctober 25, 2023 at 11:17 AM
the monkeys are me during any English lesson
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sushiDecember 2, 2023 at 4:14 PM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zpiv39ELDjk
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