Wandering Aimlessly United States
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November 5, 2005
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" 1,000,000 divide by 100,000=10 (this means you have a 1 in 10 shot of winning if you buy one hundred thousand tickets assuming no doubles) "
Benmas, to me, this is a silly example. I mean, whether or not it's true, the whole point of gambling is to come out a winner, isn't it?
Any game that has only a million to one odds isn't going to pay much. So why would you spend $100,000 on tickets? 1 in 10 isn't that great either!! I mean, isn't 1 in 10 only a 10% shot because you have a 90% chance of not getting the correct combination? Am I missing something here? Why would anyone spend $100,000 with those odds? No wonder all those people on Deal or No Deal turn down $200,000 for a chance to win a million when the odds are 1 in 6. They always lose too!
Plus, the only way to buy that many tickets for a game would be to get several people to go to numerous locations and purchase the tickets. One person would not be able to mark hundreds of thousand of boxes, play hundreds of thousand of cards, so you'd end up splitting the prize anyway.
Your last 3 words mean a lot. "assuming no doubles" I've seen many jackpots that have been split, even 3 ways. The lower the odds, the more people win (in most cases) but then the jackpots are considerably smaller because they rollover less.
"AT the end of the day i dont really care what the odds say...in order to win you have to be lucky... "
Yes, I agree 100%. The person who won the $37 million FL jackpot Wed bought a quick pick. I played 5 personal picks. He/she was at the right place at the right time. We'll never know if this person bought 1 ticket or 100 tickets.
This thread started out with a person asking whether buying 50 tickets for 2 games or 100 tickets for 1 game gives better odds. I said I believe that 100 tickets for 1 game gives the best odds, which actually agrees with what most people are saying, including you.
I should have stuck with my first comment which was "it depends on which day you are wearing your lucky underwear."
Kentucky United States
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February 14, 2006
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Quote: Originally posted by justxploring on Feb 22, 2008
" 1,000,000 divide by 100,000=10 (this means you have a 1 in 10 shot of winning if you buy one hundred thousand tickets assuming no doubles) "
Benmas, to me, this is a silly example. I mean, whether or not it's true, the whole point of gambling is to come out a winner, isn't it?
Any game that has only a million to one odds isn't going to pay much. So why would you spend $100,000 on tickets? 1 in 10 isn't that great either!! I mean, isn't 1 in 10 only a 10% shot because you have a 90% chance of not getting the correct combination? Am I missing something here? Why would anyone spend $100,000 with those odds? No wonder all those people on Deal or No Deal turn down $200,000 for a chance to win a million when the odds are 1 in 6. They always lose too!
Plus, the only way to buy that many tickets for a game would be to get several people to go to numerous locations and purchase the tickets. One person would not be able to mark hundreds of thousand of boxes, play hundreds of thousand of cards, so you'd end up splitting the prize anyway.
Your last 3 words mean a lot. "assuming no doubles" I've seen many jackpots that have been split, even 3 ways. The lower the odds, the more people win (in most cases) but then the jackpots are considerably smaller because they rollover less.
"AT the end of the day i dont really care what the odds say...in order to win you have to be lucky... "
Yes, I agree 100%. The person who won the $37 million FL jackpot Wed bought a quick pick. I played 5 personal picks. He/she was at the right place at the right time. We'll never know if this person bought 1 ticket or 100 tickets.
This thread started out with a person asking whether buying 50 tickets for 2 games or 100 tickets for 1 game gives better odds. I said I believe that 100 tickets for 1 game gives the best odds, which actually agrees with what most people are saying, including you.
I should have stuck with my first comment which was "it depends on which day you are wearing your lucky underwear."
United States
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June 22, 2005
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Quote: Originally posted by justxploring on Feb 22, 2008
" 1,000,000 divide by 100,000=10 (this means you have a 1 in 10 shot of winning if you buy one hundred thousand tickets assuming no doubles) "
Benmas, to me, this is a silly example. I mean, whether or not it's true, the whole point of gambling is to come out a winner, isn't it?
Any game that has only a million to one odds isn't going to pay much. So why would you spend $100,000 on tickets? 1 in 10 isn't that great either!! I mean, isn't 1 in 10 only a 10% shot because you have a 90% chance of not getting the correct combination? Am I missing something here? Why would anyone spend $100,000 with those odds? No wonder all those people on Deal or No Deal turn down $200,000 for a chance to win a million when the odds are 1 in 6. They always lose too!
Plus, the only way to buy that many tickets for a game would be to get several people to go to numerous locations and purchase the tickets. One person would not be able to mark hundreds of thousand of boxes, play hundreds of thousand of cards, so you'd end up splitting the prize anyway.
Your last 3 words mean a lot. "assuming no doubles" I've seen many jackpots that have been split, even 3 ways. The lower the odds, the more people win (in most cases) but then the jackpots are considerably smaller because they rollover less.
"AT the end of the day i dont really care what the odds say...in order to win you have to be lucky... "
Yes, I agree 100%. The person who won the $37 million FL jackpot Wed bought a quick pick. I played 5 personal picks. He/she was at the right place at the right time. We'll never know if this person bought 1 ticket or 100 tickets.
This thread started out with a person asking whether buying 50 tickets for 2 games or 100 tickets for 1 game gives better odds. I said I believe that 100 tickets for 1 game gives the best odds, which actually agrees with what most people are saying, including you.
I should have stuck with my first comment which was "it depends on which day you are wearing your lucky underwear."
" 1,000,000 divide by 100,000=10 (this means you have a 1 in 10 shot of winning if you buy one hundred thousand tickets assuming no doubles) "
Benmas, to me, this is a silly example. I mean, whether or not it's true, the whole point of gambling is to come out a winner, isn't it?
He was only using that as an example to show the math, not that someone sane would actually do such a thing.
Zeta Reticuli Star System United States
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January 17, 2006
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Quote: Originally posted by Stack47 on Feb 22, 2008
"Oh there propbably is, but for a really heated discussion go to a Christian discussion board"
The New Testament has a Trinity; does that mean our chances of getting to Heaven are multiplied by 3?
Actually, "trinity" is nowhere in the Bible.
But I'm sure some here would insist that whether it is or not, the concept would still multiply our chances by 3!
Those who run the lotteries love it when players look for consistency in something that's designed not to have any. So many systems, so many theories, so few jackpot winners.
There is one and only one 'proven' system, and that is to book the action. No matter the game, let the players pick their own losers.
NY United States
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October 16, 2005
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Quote: Originally posted by justxploring on Feb 22, 2008
KY Floyd - first I'll answer the mortgage question. You wrote..."for a houseand selling in a few years " and in my last post one word was missing, since I wrote "less than two years." I can't blame you if I made a typo, but I'm not sure your answer would have been any different. To the best of my knowledge, not many lending institutions give great rates for flips, if they lend money for them at all, but I only know about the company I mentioned in which I trained (which didn't offer them.) Also I'm not familiar with jumbo loans for that kind of money. Still, since these investors were not living in the home or using it as a vacation home, but only purchasing it for capital gain, the type of home mortgage would not be for personal use, and those are often different rates & terms. One thing I know is the man who bought the house I now rent and the one next door paid cash and he's a multi-millionaire, so there must be something to what Coin Toss is saying. I'm sure wealthy people use many resources of which I am not aware.
Next you ask "As long as you so easily recognizethat twice as much alcohol makes the drink twice as strong, canyou explain why it wouldn't seem obvious that having twice asmany tickets for the lottery would make you twice as likely towin?"
I never said that --- you are twisting my words. I've always said that 1 ticket gives you 1 chance and 2 tickets gives you 2 chances, etc. You aren't removing the numbers you bet after you buy a ticket, but betting on the same 175 million combinations. So each ticket is like playing a new game and just as much chance of winning as the other. Yes, you definitely have more of a chance at winning and are twice as likely to win with 2 plays than 1. That is NOT the same as cutting the odds in half each time you buy another ticket.
You keep saying I'm bad in math. Maybe it's not that I'm bad in math, maybe it's that you are bad at analytical thinking.
I'm sure I've made plenty of references about "those who are bad atmath." I realize that "bad at math" is overly broad, since people canbe good at math in general but bad at certain aspects of math, butthese discusions *are* about a specific aspect of math. I get thefeeling that you read too much into some of the things I say perhapsconfusing the general use of "you" as a comment that's specificallydirected at *you*. I know you think I'm mean sometimes, but all I do isstate the truth as I believe it. One of those truths is that you don'tunderstand how odds work with multiple tickets, though I standcorrected on one point.
"Yes, you definitely have more of a chance at winning and are twice as likely to win with 2 plays than 1."
Apparently you agree that buying two tickets makes you twice as likelyto win, compared to buying one ticket. I guess I've been confused byother things you've said:
"You can't possibly be cutting the odds in half by buying 2 tickets for MM."
Doubling your chances and cutting the odds in half are *exactly* thesame thing. Problem 1 is that you apparently don't understand that.You've referred to using common sense, so how about this: being twiceas likely to win requires that the odds are only half as high. They'reopposite sides of the same thing, just like 2/1 and 1/2. Note thatwhile it normally wouldn't be written as a fraction, 2 is the same as2/1 (it also equals 8/4, if that makes more sense for you).
I know you understand that 2/4 is the same as 1/2, so I have no ideawhy you don't seem to understand that odds of 2 in 4 is the same as 1in 2. Odds are fractions, so I'd think common sense would tell you thatthey both work the same way.
Here's problem 2: this quote indicates that you apparently don'tunderstand what some of us have said over and over about halving theodds:
"That is NOT the same as cutting the odds in half each time you buy another ticket."
Let me repeat part of that: "EACH time you buy another ticket."
I don't know how many times I've said it, but as far as I know, nobodyhas ever said that you halve the odds "EACH time you buy anotherticket." You and Coin Toss keep telling us we're wrong, but you don'teven know what we've said. What we have said over and over is that youhalve your odds each time you *double* the number of tickets you have.If you only have one ticket and you buy another ticket you've halvedyour odds (that is, you are twice as likely to win; they're the samething) because you've *doubled* the number of tickets you have. Todouble the number of tickets you have again you would have to buy *two*more tickets, for a total of 4. Halving your odds again would requiredoubling your tickets yet again. You'd need to get another 4, for totalof 8. Somehow you've failed to understand that. If you agree that 2tickets makes you twice as likely to win, then I presume you also agreethat 3 tickets makes you 3 times as likely to win, 37 tickets makes you37 times as likely to win, and 1363 tickets makes you 1363 times aslikely to win. Notice that for all those examples how many times morelikely you are to win is [the number of tickets]. That's the directproportion I've referred to.
NY United States
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Quote: Originally posted by Coin Toss on Feb 22, 2008
KY Floyd
"I'm sure Coin Toss is busy thinking, "but there's still 80% ofitthat isn't alcohol". As long as you so easily recognizethat twice as much alcohol makes the drink twice as strong, canyou explain why it wouldn't seem obvious that having twice asmany tickets for the lottery would make you twice as likely towin? I honestly don't think itrequiresunderstanding the math. I reallythink that for the most part theproblem is that people usefaulty math to convince themselves that theintuitive (andcorrect) answer is wrong."
No, Coin Toss is just thinking how badly people want to beleive that in an entity where the odds against winning a jakcpot are over 175,000,000 to one they can still make themselves "twice as likely to win". EACH TICKET, THAT IS EACH $1, EACH LINE OF NUMBERS IS A STAND ALONE AFFAIR OF CHANCES OF 1 IN 175,000,000.
THERE IS ONE AND ONLY ONE ONLY ONE SET OF WINNING NUMBERS DRAWN. The only ways these theories propsed here would work is if there was a set drawn for each dollar spent.
If any of these peobabilities theories propsed here weRe true, there would have to be jackpot winners every draw.
[/story]. You either get it or you don't.
As for somebody paying $1 million in cash for a houseand sellingin a few years for $1.5 million, that's an excellentexample of whypaying cash may not be the best plan. If they had taken a mortgage andput down 20% they would have made the sameprofit on a much smallerinvestment. They could have used the other 800grand to make the samehalf million on 3 other houses.
A real estate wheeler dealer would do that, a person sharp with money would do that. But human nature says the average person would put the 20% down on the first house and never invest the rest. (See Justxplorings remarks in her post about payments).
You're also assuming buyers and thus assuming that our investor who takes on a mortgage for the first house isn't going to be strapped with another one, two, or three mortgages until buyers show up.
Well, maybe some here would "invest" it in lottery tickets, after all, if the belief is every $100 spent reduces the odds by a power of 100, why $800,000 would guarantee a win for the player, a lock! My oh my, how do the lotteries stay in business?
"if the belief is every $100 spent reduces the odds by a power of 100"
Nobody has ever said it works that way. The idea that it might workthat way is only the product of your imagination. Unfortunately,
You either get it or you don't.
Zeta Reticuli Star System United States
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OK KY Floyd,
Two post above you share:
"Doubling your chances and cutting the odds in half are *exactly* thesame thing."
and then in the very next post you say:
"if the belief is every $100 spent reduces the odds by a power of 100" (quoting me)
Nobody has ever said it works that way."
So which one of your own statements above are you sticking with?
I'll listen to your respopnse "off the air", i.e., I'm out of this thread as there is no point in telling hair raising stories to bald headed men.
So what seats did you have at the 1994 World Series?
Those who run the lotteries love it when players look for consistency in something that's designed not to have any. So many systems, so many theories, so few jackpot winners.
There is one and only one 'proven' system, and that is to book the action. No matter the game, let the players pick their own losers.
Findlay, Ohio United States
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Quote: Originally posted by benmas on Feb 17, 2008
YES there is a BIG difference MATHEMATICALLY!!! The 100 being equal to 50x2 or 10x10 or any other is a mirage...they are not equal oddswise..
Examples to show the ODDS inequality: (I know the examples may not make sense sometimes profit wise but the are intended ONLY to show the odds inequality comparison)
Pennsylvania Pick 3 nite:
Which is better? (trying to hit it straight only):
case 1 (Extreme casE):
playing $1000 in 1 drawing or 1 number for 1000 draws?
playing $1000 in one draw guarantees a win 100%...(you lose $500)
playing $1 for 1000 draws is not sure to win...Example # 012 has not been drawn straight since 1993 thats 15 years nearly 5500 draws..you could lose $1000 (or even $5500)
case 2 (average case):
Play $500 for two drawings or $2 for 500 draws?
playing $500 for two draws gives a 50:50 shot twice..or overall 25% success
playing $2 in 500 draws gives 0.002^500=~0.00000001
------------------
With the amount you listed $100 it comes down to personal choice of playing...but strictly speaking in order to increase odds as much as you can the $100 in one draw is better...BUT no matter what split you make IT DOESN'T GUARANTEE anything..
Actually......
Case 1: playing $1 for 1000 draws gives you a 63.23% chance of a winning AT LEAST once.
Case 2: playing $500 for 2 drawings yields a 75% chance of winning AT LEAST once, a 50% chance of winning EXACTLY once, and a 25% chance of not winning at all, as well as a 25% chance of winning exactly twice.
Playing $2 for 500 draws gives you a 63.25% chance of winning AT LEAST once - just about like playing $1 for 1000 draws.
NY United States
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Actually you've confirmed that concentrating your plays in thefewest drawings maximizes your chances of winning at least once. You used different numbers, but you've said the same thing that benmasdid.
United States
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Quote: Originally posted by Thoth on Feb 24, 2008
Actually......
Case 1: playing $1 for 1000 draws gives you a 63.23% chance of a winning AT LEAST once.
Case 2: playing $500 for 2 drawings yields a 75% chance of winning AT LEAST once, a 50% chance of winning EXACTLY once, and a 25% chance of not winning at all, as well as a 25% chance of winning exactly twice.
Playing $2 for 500 draws gives you a 63.25% chance of winning AT LEAST once - just about like playing $1 for 1000 draws.
1-(1-0.002)^500 = .632489
1-(1-0.001)^1000 = .632305
Heh, I've seen this formula around before.
In neo-conned Amerika, bank robs you. Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms should be the name of a convenience store, not a govnoment agency.
Zeta Reticuli Star System
