Questions on Monte Carlo methods, methods that require the repeated generation of pseudo- or quasi-random numbers for computing their results.
When solving problems that depend on a large number of variables, an analytical solution may not exist or may be too hard to compute variable-by-variable because of the curse of dimensionality. In these situations, Monte Carlo methods sample the space of variables in a random way to obtain numerical approximations. The choice and distribution of sampling points is critical to obtaining accurate results – for this reason, quasi-random sampling (e.g. the Sobol or Halton sequences) is often employed.
The method was named in 1946 by Stanislaw Ulam in reference to the Monte Carlo casino.
