Edit: by predict the future, I mean predict every little event and it’s consequences in future, the human history and everything.
In: Physics
Something I haven’t seen directly mentioned is radioactive decay.
Based on the current understanding of physics this is truly random. With a given sample of a radioactive isotope we know that half will decay within a given time period, but we do not know which half, and a good portion of quantum theory suggests that there’s no way to know which half.
Prior to decay two atomic nuclei are, at the limit of our understanding of physics, identical. There’s nothing to indicate that one has a shorter timer until decay than the other.
So you have all these atoms all through the universe that can spontaneously, and unpredictably, change into another (predictable) element, while simultaneously ejecting either aN alpha particle (a new helium nucleus) or a beta particle (an electron) along with some intensity of an electromagnetic wave. If it’s part of a molecule the chemistry of the molecule will radically change, and any atoms hit by the high energy helium nucleus or electron can also be changed too.
If those atoms were doing something important, for example were the DNA of a cell or they could be the tipping point of a cancer developing, or possibly be the factor in a DNA change that leads to a mutation in the species offspring going forward.
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