BtZ42 Section 9 (pp 53-60): the sieve of chance

[Monte Davis]

Very much so -- and P scatters the language of mass-production statistics
liberally in the Byron story.

On Fri, May 13, 2016 at 12:47 PM, kelber at mindspring.com <
kelber at mindspring.com> wrote:

> Sort of the Byron the Bulb issue: is the long-burning bulb asserting it's
> will, magical, technologically-tampered or just sitting comfortably at the
> outermost extremes of the bell curve?
>
> Laura
>
> *Sent from my Verizon Wireless 4G LTE DROID*
>
>
> Monte Davis <montedavis49 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >But once it *has* settled...
> That's the crux, and a starting point for a fascinating (some other time)
> excursus into Bayesian probability. We do much more anthropomorphizing and
> projection than we know, and a some level we'll always feel that the
> roulette ball has a memory and "knows" it should start evening things out
> by settling on red. That feeling grows much faster than the unlikelihood of
> any given run of black does -- which is why more players flocked to make
> ever larger bets on red, and overall the casino did very well that night.
>
> > It would have been the same probability even if the ball at that point
> had settled on black for a few million times in a row, no?
>
> Yes -- aside from the likelihood that you would long since have concluded
> the wheel must be rigged :-)
>
>
> On Fri, May 13, 2016 at 9:32 AM, Thomas Eckhardt <
> thomas.eckhardt at uni-bonn.de> wrote:
>
>>  Monte Davis <montedavis49 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> P. 56:
>>>
>>> “But squares that have already* had* several hits, I mean—”
>>>
>>> “I’m sorry. That’s the Monte Carlo Fallacy..."
>>>
>>
>> I look at it like this: It is highly unlikely that the roulette ball
>> settles on black for 26 times in a row. But once it *has* settled on black
>> for 26 times in a row, the probability for it to do so again with the next
>> spin of the wheel is the same as before (48.6 per cent, that is).
>>
>> At least that's how I explain it to the kids...
>>
>> Where the bettors went wrong was that 26 spins of a roulette wheel simply
>>> isn't that large a number.
>>>
>>
>> Hmmm. It would have been the same probability even if the ball at that
>> point had settled on black for a few million times in a row, no?
>>
>
>
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