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Bias in R's random integers?

2 messages · Radford Neal, Duncan Murdoch

#
It seems to be a recently-introduced bug.  Here's output with R-2.15.1:

  R version 2.15.1 (2012-06-22) -- "Roasted Marshmallows"
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  ISBN 3-900051-07-0
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  > set.seed(123)
  > m <- (2/5)*2^32
  > m > 2^31
  [1] FALSE
  > x <- sample(m, 1000000, replace = TRUE)
  > table(x %% 2)
  
       0      1 
  499412 500588 
  
So I doubt that this has anything to do with bias from using 32-bit
random values.

   Radford Neal
#
On 20/09/2018 11:01 AM, Radford Neal wrote:
There are two bugs, one recent one (allowing fractional m to slip 
through) and one old one (the bias).  The test above shows the bias with 
m+1, i.e. in R 2.15.1

 > x <- sample(m + 1, 1000000, replace = TRUE)
 > table(x %% 2)

      0      1
466739 533261


and you can see it in the original m with

   x <- sample(m, 1000000, replace = TRUE)
   plot(density(x[x %% 2 == 0]))

Duncan Murdoch