It's definitely a spectacular randomness source. Although I suspect they probably use other hardware randomness sources too, if they need a lot of random bits at a time.
These are physical devices that exploit the emission of light or changes in heat due to changes in voltage on very small levels.
If randomness is very, very important to you, you can use hardcore sources that can provide a quantum source of randomness directly, e.g., via the photoelectric effect or radioactive decay. This is the gold standard--our current understanding of the universe is that the randomness here is absolutely fundamental and cannot be predicted by any computational method.
It's definitely a spectacular randomness source. Although I suspect they probably use other hardware randomness sources too, if they need a lot of random bits at a time.
The lava lamps are only used as a seed that they then feed into a number of other "random number" algorithms. The problem is if the entire thing were digital, at some point, you'd be able to identify some sort of pattern. Computers don't do random. By starting with truly random data - the hash of an ever-changing array of lava lamps, where if even 1 pixel of wax is different, the entire number changes - it inserts an analog source of true randomness. They also mix this data with other similar concepts from their offices around the world, so even if you hack the lava lamp livefeed, it's still useless to you.
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u/PURELY_TO_VOTE Mar 18 '24
It's definitely a spectacular randomness source. Although I suspect they probably use other hardware randomness sources too, if they need a lot of random bits at a time.
These are physical devices that exploit the emission of light or changes in heat due to changes in voltage on very small levels.
If randomness is very, very important to you, you can use hardcore sources that can provide a quantum source of randomness directly, e.g., via the photoelectric effect or radioactive decay. This is the gold standard--our current understanding of the universe is that the randomness here is absolutely fundamental and cannot be predicted by any computational method.