[mickeyg13]

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I don't see how this Mickey guy could possibly know that there aren't any truly random events. There could be an omniscient figure which only knows knowable things. Some events might simply be unforseeable/unknowable. There are obvious limits to omniscience and omnipotence.

Personally I think scientists can't justifiably answer this kind of question. It's not something that observation and induction ever could solve. Mostly because we have such a limited perspective on the universe.

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I guess I shouldn't have made quite such a blanket statement about randomness. Quantum mechanics is theorized to contain random events on the microscopic scale. Let's put those aside for a second. If there were a physical event that is both truly random AND not related to quantum mechanics, then it would mean science got something wrong.

Take flipping a coin. It seems random because we accept a certain degree of ignorance. We don't know the precise dimensions and mass of the coin. We don't know the precise amount of force that will be applied in the flipping action. We don't know how much wind resistance there will be, etc. All of these things appear to behave according to known laws of physics. If all of those variables were known, and all those laws of physics are correct, then all the information about the coin flip can be calculated and predicted. If the coin flip is truly random then, it must be that those laws of physics were wrong.

Now if you want to throw quantum mechanics in there, things get ugly, and personally I don't feel that the problem has been satisfactorily solved (hidden variable theories and what not). I'm no physicist, but I believe quantum mechanics was disputed by Einstein among others.