Randomness
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Malaby presents a useful framework for understanding indeterminacy, based on four categories. The first category is ''formal indeterminacy'', what we commonly refer to as chance. This is any form of random allotment, which often can be understood and predicted through statistical methods. Malaby argues that the ascendancy of statistical thinking in the social sciences has skewed our conception of indeterminacy in gambling (in particular) and in our lives (in general) so much that formal indeterminacy has become a stand-in for other types of indeterminacies. The second category is ''social indeterminacy'', which is the impossibility of knowing or understanding someone else’s point of view or intentions. A bluff is a type of social indeterminacy. The third category is ''performative indeterminacy'', that is, the unreliability of one's own or of another's actions, say a fumble in football game or misreading the information in plain view on a chess board. Finally, the fourth category described by Malaby is ''cosmological indeterminacy,'' which refers to skepticism about the fairness and legitimacy of the rules of the game in the first place at a local, institutional, or cosmological level. Suspicion that a game is “rigged,” for example, is a cosmological indeterminacy (Malaby 15-17). | Malaby presents a useful framework for understanding indeterminacy, based on four categories. The first category is ''formal indeterminacy'', what we commonly refer to as chance. This is any form of random allotment, which often can be understood and predicted through statistical methods. Malaby argues that the ascendancy of statistical thinking in the social sciences has skewed our conception of indeterminacy in gambling (in particular) and in our lives (in general) so much that formal indeterminacy has become a stand-in for other types of indeterminacies. The second category is ''social indeterminacy'', which is the impossibility of knowing or understanding someone else’s point of view or intentions. A bluff is a type of social indeterminacy. The third category is ''performative indeterminacy'', that is, the unreliability of one's own or of another's actions, say a fumble in football game or misreading the information in plain view on a chess board. Finally, the fourth category described by Malaby is ''cosmological indeterminacy,'' which refers to skepticism about the fairness and legitimacy of the rules of the game in the first place at a local, institutional, or cosmological level. Suspicion that a game is “rigged,” for example, is a cosmological indeterminacy (Malaby 15-17). | ||
| − | The privileging of the stochastic principles of formal determinacy means that players, scholars, and even programmers dismiss social and performative indeterminacies altogether. In the case of 10 PRINT, thinking about social indeterminacy reveals several new layers of randomness to the program, such as the idiosyncratic line numbers in the 1982 and 1984 versions of the program. Likewise, understanding performative indeterminacies may account for the textual variants of the program, for example, the version that appeared in the Commodore Free Magazine that in fact will not execute as printed. | + | The privileging of the stochastic principles of formal determinacy means that players, scholars, and even programmers dismiss social and performative indeterminacies altogether. In the case of 10 PRINT, thinking about social indeterminacy reveals several new layers of randomness to the program, such as the idiosyncratic line numbers in the 1982 and 1984 versions of the program. Likewise, understanding performative indeterminacies may account for the textual variants of the program, for example, the version that appeared in the ''Commodore Free Magazine'' that in fact will not execute as printed. |
Cosmological indeterminacy is perhaps the most difficult form of indeterminacy to apply to 10 PRINT. The rise of the scientific method can be seen as one enduring struggle to impose a more rational view upon the world, abolishing cosmological indeterminacy. From Aristotle to Galileo to Newton, classical mechanics defined the universe as an organized system without random actions. Even Einstein declared that "God does not play dice with the universe." Yet, as a closer examination of randomness on the Commodore 64 will reveal, there is evidence that randomness on the Commodore 64 -- and indeed, on any computer -- is fundamentally "rigged" in a way that echoes Malaby's idea of cosmological indeterminacy. Randomness and chance operations are so necessary to daily life, well beyond the realm of games, that randomness itself must be fixed, repeatable and knowable. | Cosmological indeterminacy is perhaps the most difficult form of indeterminacy to apply to 10 PRINT. The rise of the scientific method can be seen as one enduring struggle to impose a more rational view upon the world, abolishing cosmological indeterminacy. From Aristotle to Galileo to Newton, classical mechanics defined the universe as an organized system without random actions. Even Einstein declared that "God does not play dice with the universe." Yet, as a closer examination of randomness on the Commodore 64 will reveal, there is evidence that randomness on the Commodore 64 -- and indeed, on any computer -- is fundamentally "rigged" in a way that echoes Malaby's idea of cosmological indeterminacy. Randomness and chance operations are so necessary to daily life, well beyond the realm of games, that randomness itself must be fixed, repeatable and knowable. | ||
