the monkey -jumping on keyboards and managing to type the works of shakespeare scenario-demystified

The grittiest detail in this problem is that the answer is only yes if we are talking about an infinite number of trials; that is, having an infinite number of monkeys or letting one monkey pound away for an infinite amount of time. If we are restricted to a finite number of monkeys and a finite amount of time, then the answer is no. It is entirely possible that in a finite amount of time a finite number of monkeys may type out nothing but pages upon pages of meaningless drivel. It's also possible (although unlikely) that one monkey may get it right the first time.



A typical digitized picture on your computer screen is 640 pixels long by 480 pixels wide, for a total of 307200 pixels. Using only 256 different colors, you can get decent resolution. Now if you take 256^307200 (256 times itself 307200 times) you get... well, a pretty big number, but a finite number nonetheless. That's the number of different images you can have of that particular size. Any picture you would scan into a computer at that size and resolution will necessarily be one of those images. Therefore, contained in those images are the images of the faces of every human being who ever lived along with the images of the faces of every person yet to be born. Deep stuff, eh? I'll leave you with that thought. Thanks for reading this