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Consider the following regular sequence:
ABABABABABABABAB

This sequence is obviously not what we would call “random” but why?

• Because we see a pattern namely, a constantly repeating “AB” subsequence
• We feel because we have understood or characterised the sequence
• There is a reason for each letter (specificity)
• A simple rule describes the sequence (type “AB” eight times)

Now consider the following “random” sequence:
QAEDTGUJOLWSRFZHIK

We have no obvious pattern, not even the repetition of characters. We call it random, why?

• We see no pattern
• We don’t understand how the sequence is characterized
• We see no reason for each letter (no specificity)
• The “rule” for describing the sequence is as complex as the sequence (type “QAEDTGUJOLWSRFZHIK” once)

But why should we call something random just because the rule for generating it is complex? The following sequence has a complex rule but it’s not random:
ABDGKPV
(The rule is: Proceed through the alphabet skipping an increasing amount of letters.)

We can’t even say complexity is an indicator of randomness. As humans, when we see a complex sequence we don’t understand we call it “random”. We can never be sure that it is random because we can never know if there is indeed a law or algorithm defining which character comes next. “Random” means we don’t know how it was generated.

Getting back to our random sequence (QAEDTGUJOLWSRFZHIK). Perhaps the best minds in the world would agree, even bet the farm, that this is random until they tried to type it and noticed the pattern which is only obvious on a swiss-german keyboard (typing diagonal pairs down the first 2 rows, skipping even columns and then starting again from the 2nd column skipping all odd columns). You just never know ;-)

Now for a “really random” sequence:
UKSDJDMXWPALKDJIWQ

Here I really cannot explain the trick – I just typed with my eyes closed – it seems to me to be properly random (if that exists). Perhaps if a monkey did the same thing you’d see something like this:
SSSSSSSSSSSSSSKKKKKKKKKKKKK

This is a much simpler sequence and we see what we call a “pattern” as the primate battered the same keys repeatedly. We thus assume it was regular and not random. However this would be a mistake because both sequences were both produced unconsciously, that is, without intent and purpose and yet we call only one “random” and the other one “regular” because we think we see a pattern. Yet the pattern was not something the monkey intended to do. We still have an arbitrary pattern.

What’s the real difference between my “random” pattern and the monkey’s? Is there any? Or were they both non-random?

Although we can probably not trace them there were reasons behind each of my strokes in the “really random” sequence. I can’t tell you what they were but my fingers did not switch to “random” mode and just fly around the keyboard. As I was typing I considered how I could move around the keyboard enough to avoid a pattern and tried to use all my fingers roughly equally. I tried to “make” random and in doing so reasoned each key with limited specificity but not zero specificity.

In summary the verdict “random” is always tentative – it’s our way of saying “this sequence is complex and we don’t know to specify it without writing it out in full”. In fact, if something were truly random it would not be up for investigation, it would cease to be science. Is Darwinism not science after all?

This has profound consequences for the debate about whether life’s complexity and elegance indicates intelligent design. We say a species evolves into another species by random mutation and what we really mean is “we can’t see any direction or purpose here” or “why did God do it like that when this way would have been quicker?”. This reminds me of when emminent scientists pronounce something useless (like an appendix) and we only have to wait a few decades to have this proved incorrect when someone finds a use (Appendix Function). It’s not difficult to prove something has no use or cause – it’s truly impossible. Thus I believe Theistic Evolution is a realistic view for a believer to hold and reject the assertion that “there is nothing for God to do” – it’s Him doing it, holding it all together, but we can’t see it so we call it “random” and take it for granted.