@tante most of the time you also want random number generators to also be deterministic, but yes.

@tante since when did pseudo-random number generators not suffice for the examples in this thread? Surely Monte Carlo doesn't need true random, or am I missing something?

@tante My honest, nitpicky answer is 'no'; that said, I feel pretty strongly that MOST good tools probably SHOULD be deterministic.

@tante

Casino Owner: Yes definitely!

@tante No, because of various statistical methods (Monte Carlo has been mentioned), and my double slit experiment isn't deterministic either ;)

@tante
Do predictable, reproducible and auditable results mean deterministic?

@tante so following from your edit, the poll asks whether tools need to be deterministic except when they need not to be? My boltzmann machine is ruled out? 🤔

@tante Thinking about it for a few minutes, this quickly becomes very philosophical. Some believe the whole existence is deterministic.

But nevertheless we have structures that seem to us humans non deterministic. Given that, I would say a 'good' technology should not only be deterministic it should also seem deterministic to us humans. Otherwise its magic and not technology.

@tante I answered “yes”, because for me a tool does one particular job. And I need it to be dependable and correct. That said, there are probably niche use cases beyond random numbers that warrant non-deterministic results. For example, I use a transcription tool which is (because it is an LLM use case) non-deterministic, but the result is easily verifiable.

@tante random number generators spring to mind...

@tante There’s not a lot of software that is deterministic, but I’ve never met a good one that isn’t.

@tante Paint brushes are not very deterministic, I think they are good.

But maybe the question builds upon a abstract random/deterministic dichotomy that makes not sense for many technologies.

@tante No, because RNGs can be a "good" piece of technology. Of course, those are deterministic if you fix the seed, but let's ignore that for now.

@tante trick question! We don't live in a universe that allows deterministic processes.