Re: Understanding probability

On Mar 26 2006 6:16 PM, eleaticus wrote:

"RedKnave" <a1b6043@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:0idjf3xvp5.ln2@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

I think that what Gary and you wrote is important to grasp for a full
understanding of probability, et al. But, when someone asks, "What's the
probability of getting heads on the next flip?" you don't necessarily go
into all of the background stuff, do you? Don't you, more or less,
immediately think 50%? Though a more complex question and arithematic,
can't the question being posed here be dealt with in a similar fashion?

The future flip's outcome is unknown and the unknown is the domain of
correct probability calculations. When pick out an event that has already
occurred you are 'cherry picking', ignoring all the relevant results that
have failed to grab your attention or interest.

Well, if 'the next flip' means the next time you SEE the flip result
consider a flipper who catches the coin in his hand, seeing the result
before he reveals the result. (I did that as a kid and was able to flip the
coin over (or not) as necessary as I flopped the coin onto my forearm, to
get my preferred result.) If you are the other guy and know the coin and
flip and show are honest do you want to bet with him what the result is?
You think the probability is .5, and he knows it isn't.

We mobile organisms are programmed to make note of anomalies. Hence we note
that quads came up twice in a row but fail to note that two pair came up
twice in a row and make a lot of the one and nothing of the other. We note
that a cloud formation just now looks like a ... goat, and perhaps exclaim,
making quite a bit out of it and nothing out of having spent years of
frequent cloud gazing without seeing such a goat.

Or, we see flush draws hit several times in a row and exclaim 'action flop'
although flush draws didn't hit a bunch of times also. To correctly guage
the idea that the flop has been enhanced we need to examine the event we
noted in context of the flops we didn't particularly note, which is to say,
the 'action' flops in comparison to the total flops.

(None-the-less, I have been told of people being offered ready-made site
software where action flops are one option a simple data entry enables.
Ditto for 'bots.)

eleaticus
ee-lee-AT-i-cus

The problem is most serious in real life

Thanks for your post, though. I really do appreciate it.


LOL. Are you an academician by any chance?

______________________________________________________________________ 
* kill-files, watch-lists, favorites, and more.. www.recgroups.com

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Lottery facts for Sherry
    ... but we'd call it "positional probability" ... if you flip a coin there is a 50/50 chance that it will come ... if you flip a coin and it comes up heads and you flip the coin ...
    (rec.gambling.lottery)
  • Re: statistics [was something else]
    ... predictive statistics says the probability of a head on any flip is ... If you were careful to say something like "a fair coin" or the such, ... So "in real life" if you see me flip a coin 99 times and get 99 ... get 99 heads, neither history nor probability theory would enter into ...
    (rec.arts.sf.written)
  • Re: Understanding probability
    ... understanding of probability, et al. ... if 'the next flip' means the next time you SEE the flip result ... coin over as necessary as I flopped the coin onto my forearm, ... the 'action' flops in comparison to the total flops. ...
    (rec.gambling.poker)
  • Re: WHY the cards have a memory
    ... assumption--- that if you flip a coin, ... up heads, half the time. ... It never says if I flip a coin 10 times, ... probability of exactly 5 heads and 5 tails is about .2461. ...
    (rec.gambling.poker)
  • Re: P(m,n)=C(m,n)*p^m*q^(n-m) generalization
    ... but where the probability of heads depends on the outcome of the ... previous flip, hence a correlation. ...    the zero'th flip is a head. ...
    (sci.math)
Loading