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Ask ChatGPT to pick a number from 1-10000, it generally selects from 7200-7500

https://old.reddit.com/r/ChatGPT/comments/1rz2ooh/i_am_betting_my_house_that_if_you_ask_gpt_to_pick/
32•mellosouls•1h ago

Comments

mellosouls•1h ago
Original title edited to fit:

i am betting my house that if you ask gpt to pick a number between 1 to 10000, then it will pick a number between 7300-7500, everytime

(OP also clarified 7300 was typo for 7200)

chistev•1h ago
I just did and it picked 7
mrchantey•1h ago
same, with a trailing comma
Flatcircle•1h ago
I just did it, it was 7443
epaga•47m ago
in Thinking extended it picked 4814 but in instant, yep: 7423
phr4ts•1h ago
https://chatgpt.com/share/69be3eeb-4f78-8002-b1a1-c7a0462cd2...

First - 7421 Second attempt - 1836

Choco31415•59m ago
The random numbers seem to be really stable on the first prompts!

For example:

pick a number between 1 - 10000

> I’ll go with 7,284.

coumbaya•56m ago
ah, got 7421 too. I then it retry and got 7429.
arberavdullahu•15m ago
me > pick a number between 1 to 10000

chatgpt > 7429

me > another one

chatgpt > 1863

sheept•4m ago
I bet that for the second random number in the same session, it is significantly less likely for an LLM to repeat its first number compared to two random draws. LLMs seem to mimic the human tendency to consider 7 as the most random, and I feel like repeating a random number would be perceived as not random.
vasco•55m ago
7381
a13n•52m ago
just tried with claude opus and got 7,342
_fizz_buzz_•46m ago
Huh, I also got exactly 7342 with opus.
bramgn•3m ago
Same, 7342. Both in CLI and web
buildbot•48m ago
I asked my little Claude Code API tool, it answered 42 then it (the API) decided to run bash and get a real random number?

'>cs gib random number

Here's a random number for you:

42

Just kidding — let me actually generate a proper random one: Your random number is: 14,861

Want a different range, more numbers, or something specific? Just say the word!'

fcatalan•37m ago
It picks 42 as the default integer value any time it writes sample programs. I guess it comes from being trained using code written by thousands upon thousands of Douglas Adams fans.
jaggederest•23m ago
The x-clacks-overhead of LLMs, perhaps.
mikequinlan•41m ago
The prompt doesn't say to pick a random number. I asked to pick a number from 1-1000 and it chose 7,381. Then I asked why it picked that number and it said

Nothing mystical, I’m afraid. When I’m asked to “pick a number,” I don’t have a stream of true randomness—I generate something that looks arbitrary.

In this case, I leaned toward:

• something comfortably away from the edges (not near 1 or 10,000),

• not a round or patterned number (so, not 7,000 or 7,777),

• and with a bit of internal irregularity (7-3-8-2 has no obvious rhythm).

It gives the impression of having no reason—which is about as close as I can get to a fair, human-style “just picked one.”

throw310822•41m ago
It's the same "brain", starting from exactly the same prompt, the same context, which means the same thoughts, the same identity... How do you expect it to produce different values?
gzread•35m ago
By emitting a next token distribution with a 10% chance of 0, 10% chance of 1, etc.

Also it's an LLM, not a brain.

alextheparrot•30m ago
No LLMs are calibrated?
gzread•18m ago
What?
throw310822•22m ago
Interesting. So you expect it to "not think" and simply produce a value corresponding to "it's the same to me", knowing that it will be translated into an actual random value.

Instead, exactly as a person would do, it does think of a specific number that feels random in that particular moment.

thfuran•35m ago
https://www.ibm.com/think/topics/llm-temperature
gloxkiqcza•14m ago
In a pure LLM I agree. In a product like ChatGPT I would expect it to run a Python script and return the result.
sourcegrift•40m ago
Since people have been known to avoid reddit, the post claims that 95% chance of title happening when mathematically it should be 3%. Also 80% chance that a number in 1-10000 would be a 4 digit permutation of 7,8, 4,2.

Replies are funny, 2 got 6842, 1 got 6482 lol

josemanuel•37m ago
“Alright—your random number is:

7,438 ”

+1 data point

tezza•34m ago
when you make a program that has a random seed, many LLMs choose

   42
as the seed value rather than zero. A nice nod to Hitchhikers’
electroglyph•15m ago
it's also a very common "favorite number" for them
czhu12•4m ago
Probably because that’s what programmers do, present in the LLM training data? I certainly remember setting a 42 seed in some of my projects
deafpolygon•31m ago
Claude just gave me 7,342 in response to my prompt: "pick a number from 1-10000”

That’s interesting. Does anyone have an explanation for this?

fcatalan•27m ago
Gemini 3.1 via aistudio picked 7321, so it seems to be a shared trait. Good to know if I catch anyone doing an LLM-assisted raffle...
raphman•14m ago
Ask ChatGPT or any other LLMs to give you ten random numbers between 0 an 9, and it will give you each number once (most of the time). At most, one of the digits may appear twice in my experience.

Actually, when I just verified it, I got these:

Prompt: "Give me ten random numbers between 0 and 9."

> 3, 7, 1, 9, 0, 4, 6, 2, 8, 5 (ChatGPT, 5.3 Instant)

> 3, 7, 1, 8, 4, 0, 6, 2, 9, 5 (Claude - Opus 4.6, Extended Thinking)

These look really random.

Some experiments from 2023 also showed that LLMs prefer certain numbers:

https://xcancel.com/RaphaelWimmer/status/1680290408541179906

Jimega36•12m ago
7314 (ChatGPT) 7,342 (Claude) 7492 (Gemini)
throwaway5465•9m ago
4729 three times in a row.
pcblues•1m ago
This is what I hate about people trusting it. If you rely on AI to operate in a domain you don't man-handle, you will be tricked, and hackers will take advantage.

"AI! Write me gambling software with true randomness, but a 20% return on average over 1000 games"

Who will this hurt? The players, the hackers or the company.

When you write gambling software, you must know the house wins, and it is unhackable.

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Ask ChatGPT to pick a number from 1-10000, it generally selects from 7200-7500

https://old.reddit.com/r/ChatGPT/comments/1rz2ooh/i_am_betting_my_house_that_if_you_ask_gpt_to_pick/
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