Last time I hallway tested it, people couldn’t tell what prime numbers are, and to my surprise even the ones with tech/math-y background forgot it. My results were something 1.5/10 (ages 30+-5) and I didn’t go to cabinets where I knew there are zero chances.
But there's a difference between "knowing what the formal definition is" and "having a feeling that a number is somehow unique due to it's indivisibility".
The theory I've heard is that the more prime a number is, the more random it feels. 13 feels more awkward and weird, and it doesn't come up naturally as often as 2 or 3 do in everyday life. It's rare, so it must be more random! I'll give you the most random number I can think of!
People tend to avoid extremes, too. If you ask for a number between 1 and 10, people tend to pick something in the middle. Somehow, the ordinal values of the range seem less likely.
Additionally, people tend to avoid numbers that are in other ranges. Ask for a number from 1 to 100, and it just feels wrong to pick a number between 1 and 10. They asked for a number between 1 and 100. Not this much smaller range. You don't want to give them a number they can't use. There must be a reason they said 100. I wonder if the human RNG would improve if we started asking for numbers between 21 and 114.
Okay, this is a nitpick, but I don't think ordinal can be used in that way. "Somehow, the ordinal values of the range seem less likely". I'd probably go with extremes of the range? Or endpoints?
My guess is that we bias towards numbers with cultural or personal significance. 7 is lucky in western cultures and is religiously significant (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/7#Culture). 42 is culturally significant in science fiction, though that's a lot more recent. There are probably other examples, but I imagine the mean converges on numbers with multiple cultural touchpoints.
I have never heard of 7 being a lucky number in western culture and your link doesn't support that. 3 is a lucky number, 13 is an unlucky number, 7 is nothing to me.
So I don't think its that, 7 is still a very common "random number" here even though there is no special cultural significance to it.
Have you heard of Las Vegas? The 777 being the grand prize? Maybe it is not universal to all of western society but I have never before today heard of a culture where 3 was the lucky number. The USA’s culturally lucky number is absolutely 7.
I don't live in USA, the west includes Europe. 7 is maybe a lucky number in USA but not where I live. So I think that would be more of an American thing than a western thing maybe. Or maybe its related to some parts of Christianity but not others.
I’ve heard 7 as lucky all my life in the US and it’s mentioned in the Wikipedia page for 7. I think if you asked the average English-speaking American to name a number thought of as lucky most people would say 7.
Lucky Seven/Lucky Number Seven is also just a common phrase in American culture. There’s even a Wikipedia page of things called Lucky [Number] Seven. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucky_7
>>I have never heard of 7 being a lucky number in western culture and your link doesn't support that. 3 is a lucky number, 13 is an unlucky number, 7 is nothing to me.
Some sustain that 7 is the God's number, stemming from "God created the world in seven days"[1]
Also, _"According to some, 777 represents the threefold perfection of the Trinity"_ [2]
It's definitely used in slot machines as a lucky number. Which came first I'm not sure (but I suspect from a sibling comment in the same thread it's based on perceived commonality and primeness historically and became "lucky" in the past because of that).
While I have never heard of someone referring to 7 as a lucky number, 7 is the most common sum of two rolled dice. So I can see how people would regard it as a lucky number. Along the same lines, I assume that someone who mentions 42 as a random number has at least some interest in science fiction.
I prefer to calculate with numbers, and don't pay much attention to superstitions around them. I don't gamble, nor much pay attention to conversations about gambling, so I pretty much ignore any mention of lucky numbers when such topics arise (aside from knowing that some people have lucky numbers). If you refer being isolated from a particular aspect of life living under a rock, so be it. Though I will point out that I like wide open space. I'm more of an astronomer than a geologist!
Hmm really? Even on the Wikipedia page for 7 (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/7), one of the first things it says is “7 is often considered lucky in Western culture and is often seen as highly symbolic.” And FWIW you can see the Wikipedia edit history, that isn’t a recent edit, nobody here is messing with it :)
“Lucky Number 7” is a common phrase, there was even a popular movie that played on this, “Lucky Number Slevin” (https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0425210/). It’s one of the first numbers I’d think of as a “lucky number.”
