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Old 01-16-2012, 05:02 PM  
raymor
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Join Date: Oct 2002
Posts: 3,745
Quote:
Originally Posted by ruff View Post
7,155,577,026,378,634,231,908,944,079,486,976 pairs he has to try. I guess that's only if he finally gets to the last pair. What happens if he gets them on try number 4?
People win the lottery you know. I don't, but I read about them all the time.
That's why I said "on average". There's an infinitesimal chance (roughly one in 577,026,378,634,231,908,944,070) of getting one right on the first guess. There's an equal chance of guessing any particular combo last. "On average" are important words if you're going to get into the math.

Of course, even if I had forgotten those words amd I was off by a factor of a million, that doesn't change the fact that the attacker will die long before succeeding.

Last edited by raymor; 01-16-2012 at 05:15 PM..
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