Ray Saintonge wrote:
When at Wikisources [[Pi to 1,000,000 places]] an
anonymous user
changes the first 10 digits of line 14320 from "0628419546" to
"1516171819" how is anyone possible able to know which is correct?
:-) :'(
The obvious thing to do would be to revert it. The chances that the
anonymous user knew pi to 1,000,000 decimal places and noticed the
error are pretty small. The regularity of the sequence "1516171819"
should be a giveaway, just like the sequence inserted in the same edit
on the previous line "1234567890".
That said, a google search turned up a site apparently made for
precisely this problem:
http://www.angio.net/pi/bigpi.cgi?UsrQuery=6014280388
Not that it matters, you only need tens of digits to solve any
conceivable physical problem. What a waste of disk space.
Thanks to all of you who responded on this. The only useful value for
the the article that comes to mind is as a convenient long list of
pseudo-random numbers when somebody needs one. Beyond that, the love
that some people have for this sort of thing gives a fantastic insight
into their characters.
Thanks for catching the sequence; I should have noticed it myself.
I've reverted the vandalism and protected the page. That seemed the
simpler option. I didn't really want to get into a fight about deleting
this; I get enough fights already.
Ec