heyy all ppl!

[becky]

yes im goth. yes i love goth guys. yes i love chains. yes im sarcastic all the time. im really interesting(as my mom says lol its code for scaring the shit out of her) i love to be random. i love to talk to friends. but im new here so i have no friends yet so hook me up and thank me later as i joke about everything untill ur rolling on the floor laughing bitchezzzz!

[viscus]

You don't love to be "random," you love to be "non-sequitur." We also have an intro forum for these sorts of threads.

And I'm going to take a guess and say you're 14 years old.

[Godslayer Jillian]

Let's turn this thread into something more interesting.
I have a question for you.
Even disregarding the idiots that call themselves "random", let's pretend that that actually mean something, wouldn't being random and being sarcastic be mutually exclusive?
Not dichotomous, just mutually exclusive.

[HumanePain]

Sarcasm could belong to the set of random, but random would not belong to the set of sarcasm as then it would ipso facto no longer be random.

[Pyre]

There are more things wrong with what she said than just "I am sarcastic and random." Terrible, terrible things. Namely that she's interesting, why of course.

[ZyklonB]

And here lies the badly written introduction of a new member in the wrong section, a member who will probably never come back. May it rest in peace.

[Godslayer Jillian]

But sarcasm can never be random because it needs some deliberation for it to be witty. That's my take on it.

[viscus]

Does sarcasm have to be clever, or just insulting?

I suppose if someone's behavior is so incredibly erratic, it follows that they wouldn't have the intelligence and understanding of irony to make a clever joke about something. It's a bit of stretch to say that the two are mutually exclusive, though.

[Underwater Ophelia]

Why would being erratic mean you're not intelligent?

[Beneath the Shadows]

Randomly sarcastic?

[Pyre]

One may be capable of making a sarcastic joke without having to put any thought into it simply out of habit. One can be "random" and sarcastic, though perhaps not simultaneously. Besides, judging by her posts, I am not sure if her sarcasm is nearly on par with that of some members here, and is likely poorly executed.

[Mr E Nigma]

Randomness is quite nearly impossible. If not impossible at all. Everything is connected even thoughts. Just because one person says something about slurpees and someone else interjects with something about hawaii or odor eaters doesn't mean they are being random. A string of conscious thought processes brought the person from point A to point B quite rationally and without what we perceive to be 'randomness' or whatever that term would be.

Point being, the term 'random' is quite pointless to be honest. I mean, if anyone really thinks about it's meaning, lacking connection to what is being said at present. There is a connection. Just because it isn't spoken doesn't mean it's inexistence. (Chalk one up to me for creating a triple negative in the same sentence.. I think.)

No one can ever actually be random.

All in all I quite agree with Viscus and Jillian.

Non sequitur, apparently, is used in the place of the 'random' term but it does not mean the same thing, which is probably why viscus used it.

Also... THARRRR'S A TROLLLLL IN ZEE DUNGEON!!!

[Pyre]

Eh, that's not necessarily true. Sometimes I say things without giving them a thought first while they do not fit into a conversation I am having. Schizophrenics struggle with streams of consciousness, as well. But, I used the term in quotation marks to imply I did not mean it as its definition, but as it is used so often.

[Underwater Ophelia]

The connection is there whether you realize it or not.
Humans aren't random.

[Sir Canvas Corpsey]

Originally Posted by Underwater Ophelia

The connection is there whether you realize it or not.
Humans aren't random.

Agreed

People have called me 'random' because my train of thought (that I am not actively aware of) has brought me to a different end than them, but as I explain to them, I can always find a connection or several connections.

Part of the fun for them now is figuring out the possible connections that could lead to my response. =/

As Ophie said;
"Humans aren't random."

[Mr E Nigma]

Originally Posted by Pyre

Eh, that's not necessarily true. Sometimes I say things without giving them a thought first while they do not fit into a conversation I am having. Schizophrenics struggle with streams of consciousness, as well. But, I used the term in quotation marks to imply I did not mean it as its definition, but as it is used so often.

Just because a person doesn't actively control those thoughts doesn't mean it's random. Sub-consciousness and all that. It is quite literally all connected through train of thought.

Ophelia basically said what I said in quite a simpler way. I quite agree.

The stream of consciousness is the connection. Whether you consciously realize the thoughts or not.

[Pyre]

I did not say that I have random moments or that even schizophrenics are random, but that sometimes there are very loose connections that may not be clear to any person, including the one who said it. There are times when one may appear to be randomly generating information, however, but we certainly aren't computers.

[Mr E Nigma]

Eh, that's not necessarily true.

I think people took that to mean you were saying that what I said wasn't necessarily true. Which is what provoked the other 2 subsequent posts, because, yeah that is true. What people define as random, in our society, isn't actually random.

To the same effect that even computers aren't random, But just a series of scripts or commands to make something look random. Casinos are quite happy about the perception of that facade.

[viscus]

Originally Posted by Underwater Ophelia

Why would being erratic mean you're not intelligent?

Completely erratic, I said. You wouldn't be able to discern any kind of reasoning from a person by whom everything said and done has no relation to anything else.

I've never known of a person to exist like that, however. Those who at first appear erratic typically do have a pattern or logic to their behavior if you look at them closely.

Originally Posted by Mr E Nigma

Non sequitur, apparently, is used in the place of the 'random' term but it does not mean the same thing, which is probably why viscus used it.

"Random" is currently one of the most abused words in the English language, it means "by chance." As Ophelia pointed out, humans are not random. They have conscious thought and volition.

"Non sequitur" means "does not follow." If I were to walk into the middle of a discussion and yell the word "vagina," I would be being non sequitur.

[Pyre]

Originally Posted by Mr E Nigma

I think people took that to mean you were saying that what I said wasn't necessarily true. Which is what provoked the other 2 subsequent posts, because, yeah that is true. What people define as random, in our society, isn't actually random.

To the same effect that even computers aren't random, But just a series of scripts or commands to make something look random. Casinos are quite happy about the perception of that facade.

That has to do with the way I word things. If I start anything with "Eh" it's often a signifier that I am about to say something that opposes what was previously said without taking an actual stance against it. Of course, I don't think anyone realizes that but me, including those I speak to regularly. But, the sentence was intended to mean "Well, it could be seen this way. . ." I understand the dictionary definition of the term and was not trying to define it, but I acknowledge that there are degrees in which why a person could mistake a disjunct stream of consciousness for randomness.

[Sir Canvas Corpsey]

Originally Posted by viscus

"Non sequitur" means "does not follow." If I were to walk into the middle of a discussion and yell the word "vagina," I would be being non sequitur.

I should find some of Dorothy Q.'s essays, she is the queen of of non-sequiturs.

She couldn't segway a topic from red apples to green apples.

[Underwater Ophelia]

Originally Posted by Pyre

I did not say that I have random moments or that even schizophrenics are random, but that sometimes there are very loose connections that may not be clear to any person, including the one who said it. There are times when one may appear to be randomly generating information, however, but we certainly aren't computers.

Why do you say the bit about computers?
Certainly you realize that computers cannot be random, either...

[gothicusmaximus]

Originally Posted by Underwater Ophelia

Certainly you realize that computers cannot be random, either...

A computer can actually be perfectly random, as it can be programmed to, for instance, carry out an algorithm by which it selects a single word from the Oxford English Dictionary, each term assigned an equal probability of being chosen. Whereas a person commanded to shout a 'random' word will be more inclined to choose his or her favorite word, a word he or she heard recently, or a word he or she identifies as 'more random than others' (e.g. spork), a computer will be influenced by no such biases.

If you're going to suggest that such a process isn't random because the machine is restricted to generating only words, don't, because randomness can easily exist in a microcosm. It's not, despite what certain members of this forum seem to believe, some unattainable ideal of pure chaos-- in fact, the dictionary definition references the random selection of numbers.

[Seidre]

Originally Posted by gothicusmaximus

A computer can actually be perfectly random, as it can be programmed to, for instance, carry out an algorithm by which it selects a single word from the Oxford English Dictionary, each term assigned an equal probability of being chosen. Whereas a person commanded to shout a 'random' word will be more inclined to choose his or her favorite word, a word he or she heard recently, or a word he or she identifies as 'more random than others' (e.g. spork), a computer will be influenced by no such biases.

If you're going to suggest that such a process isn't random because the machine is restricted to generating only words, don't, because randomness can easily exist in a microcosm. It's not, despite what certain members of this forum seem to believe, some unattainable ideal of pure chaos-- in fact, the dictionary definition references the random selection of numbers.

It's true that computers do not share the same bias, but they are not completely random either. Computer programs are pseudo-random, generated using a mathmatical formula that appears to be random. Some use atmospheric noise, which does seem to be much more random than a mathmatical formula since it lacks a definite plan (can't say for sure though since I don't fully understand how the atmospheric noise method works)...But in the end, it's just another form of bias. While the numbers/words/whatever may seem unpredictable to us, they aren't completely random. There is a connection.

[Raptor]

Originally Posted by gothicusmaximus

If you're going to suggest that such a process isn't random because the machine is restricted to generating only words, don't, because randomness can easily exist in a microcosm.

The outcome is predictable though, Seidre is right. It needs random input to generate a random output.