Waaah! ... several minutes later and I realize what it is by glancing at the start-end date/timestamps.<p>Even the book they linked to seems odd, including all the review statements.
I always thought the best random number generator was:<p>Take a large Pseudo random #, & add that (in hours) to your current time. Pick a large enough pseudo space to cover 10+ years. Then, read that combined time in microseconds. This combines a real randomness (your current microseconds) that spans all space.<p>That would cover a very large space in a very random fashion.<p>The attacker would have to know your computed time to narrow it down, but couldn't narrow it down much at all, since it's combined with the large pseudo random #.<p>The problem with most Pseudo's is that they are sparse, leaving too much space unhit.
April Fools finished 4 hours ago for me so I don't really find this funny at all.<p>I feel kinda annoyed that I looked at what superficially looked like a interesting problem. Can you find the algorithm given pseudorandom random numbers? Can you find any sort of pattern? Interesting stuff that's all within the realms of the possible.<p>I understand why people in the Kaggle community would enjoy it, you visit their site and see a funny joke, it helps build community.<p>Not so funny when you get sent straight there.
Restate my assumptions: One, Mathematics is the language of nature. Two, Everything around us can be represented and understood through numbers. Three: If you graph the numbers of any system, patterns emerge. Therefore, there are patterns everywhere in nature. Evidence: The cycling of disease epidemics;the wax and wane of caribou populations; sun spot cycles; the rise and fall of the Nile. So, what about the stock market? The universe of numbers that represents the global economy. Millions of hands at work, billions of minds. A vast network, screaming with life. An organism. A natural organism. My hypothesis: Within the stock market, there is a pattern as well... Right in front of me... hiding behind the numbers. Always has been.