[net.physics] Nonexistent patterns in random numbers

flinn@seismo.UUCP (E. A. Flinn) (12/11/83)

There was a comment recently in net.games about certain sets of
characteristics in rogue being "better" than others which had exactly
the same labels, whereas the characteristics are actually assigned at
random, and the people who saw differences are deluding themselves.

This happens a good deal in the hard sciences, where one has to have a
knack of seeing patterns in noisy data.  For example, Teddy Bullard, 
an English geophysicist who had been a student of Rutherford's, once 
said that when Rutherford discovered the alpha particle, he was 
convinced that there were patterns, both in space and time, of the 
flashes of light on the crt; apparently Rutherford spent many hours 
recording times and places of the flashes, and it was only with the 
greatest reluctance that he finally discarded the idea.