Taking rational numbers at random

Abstract

We outline some simple prescriptions to define a distribution on the set ${\mathbb{Q}}_0$ of all the rational numbers in $[0,1]$, and we then explore both a few properties of these distributions, and the possibility of making these rational numbers asymptotically equiprobable in a suitable sense. In particular it will be shown that in the said limit -- albeit no uniform distribution can be properly defined on ${\mathbb{Q}}_0$ -- the probability allotted to a single $q\in {\mathbb{Q}}_0$ asymptotically vanishes, while that of the subset of ${\mathbb{Q}}_0$ falling in an interval $[a,b]$ goes to $b-a$. We finally give some hints to completely sequencing without repetitions the numbers in ${\mathbb{Q}}_0$ as a prerequisite to the laying down of more distributions on it

18 pages, 3 figures