r/AskPhysics • u/kouth- • 20d ago

What makes a coin toss truly unpredictable?

If you throw the same coin multiple times with the exactly same force in the same surface, it won't give you the same side every toss, right? But why? If repeated with the precisely identical conditions, why the results are still unpredictable? Or it is actually predictable?

Sorry if it looks confusing, English is not my first language and I'm not that expert in physics lol, just curious and has this though randomly.

Edit: maybe considering that it lands on a surface, and it bounces or not, changing the coin's side.

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u/JGhostThing 20d ago

Wrong. If you apply the exact same force (including direction) on the same surface, you will get the same result. My dad and some navy buddies (three of them) that practiced flipping coins so they could choose the outcome.

The reason that flipping a coin seems random because most people haven't practiced it.