Redneck Math: Too much pair of dice

That is a column I write in my local paper. I've got explanations of it I can post. Lately I've been using this space to promote my Redneck math.

Okie's are kind of like Aussies in the outback. Not the most sophisticated of creatures.
 
I like the redneck math:
Except, I submit it is good to gamble upon others as we would have others gamble upon us, rather than to gamble for others to lose while we would rather win. All three in that story seemed to miss that message.

To be honest, I don't know the math of the house, but I do see an edge as the house appears both rewarding and giving.
 
The house will simply make money. Always. It rewards enough to reinforce behavior that will in the long run give it a profit. Like cocaine, heroine, or methamphetamine. One might call gambling "mathamphetamine."
 
In prob/stat classes I often tell my students that I have a system for beating the lottery. This generally gets their attention, and I explain my "system":

Every day, you pick a number that you DON'T play, and put a dollar in the jelly jar for the ticket you DIDN'T buy. Then, when your number hits, you win all the money in the jelly jar-- and that will (probably) be more than the state would have given them (now that I've tricked them into paying attention, I make them calculate how probable it is that they will "win" more money my way than by actually buying tickets).
 
Most of them, actually, do find that the state's payout (50% of the "fair" value, in typical 3-digit or 4-digit daily-lotto games) is so many standard deviations less than the expectation from just saving the money that it is "off the chart", less than .01% chance, which is as far as they need to get (I then give them scary estimates about how outrageous the denominator is, in the real probability of being, say, 8 standard deviations from the mean).
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top