Quote: Originally posted by KY Floyd on Sep 29, 2016
"The last thing I want to read "
Well, it seems pretty clear that you don't always bother to read things. OTOH it seems clear that responding is a little ray of sunshine in your sorry existence. Why else would you bother when you've said several times that you're done, and you don't eve have anything you're actually answering?
"So there is no reason it couldn't happen"
There's also no reason you couldn't win PB this weekend, even if you buy just one ticket and play 1,2,3,4,5 and 6. That doesn't mean I can't say with an extremely high degree of confidence that it won't happen.
"Show the math."
You mean you don't already know what it is? You've got no idea what the probability of using the same 4 machines and 4 ball sets to do 8 consecutive drawings, but want to know how I can be sure of the improbability of it? And you've got no clue about the actual probability of one particular digit coming up in 8 consecutive drawings, but you think you've got a valid basis to compare that to the probability of results in the testing? I trust you can at least figure out the probability for drawing 4 or 5 balls from one single machine and getting the same ball each time during the tests.
I'll show you the math, but first give us an idea if you've even got a reasonable feeling for things and answer 2 simple questions. Is it more likely for a pick 4 drawing to have a digit that was in the previous drawing or to not have a digit that was in the previous drawing? Is it probable that a specific digit will be drawn, somewhat improbable, or extremely improbable?
"But it's NOT considered random in the pre-test."
You don't know what they're assuming unless they've told you. All you know is that they've got a policy of swapping out equipment if the same ball is selected too many times.
"They are trying to take away or alter the the natural random process."
How does using different equipment "alter the the natural random process"?
"Would you bet on the next flip and which would you bet H/T?"
It wouldn't matter what I bet, because if its a fair coin heads and tails always have the same probability of .5000000000000000000 (ignoring the small chance of lading on edge. As I've told Amber, that has been demonstrated time and time again by actually flipping a coin, as well as by various other tests with only two possible outcomes. It doesn't matter what the past results are. The coin doesn't know what th elast results are and there's no magical force that influences the outcome.
"If you don't believe the pre-draws interrupt Random"
Nobody here has magical powers, either. Nobody here knows exactly why the lotteries chose the exact protocols they did, except in general terms. What those of us who actually understand probability do know is that testing can't "interrupt" random. Selecting balls from the machine works exactly the same way whether it's for a test or for the official drawing that determines the winning numbers.
"explain why the pre-tests were not conducted prior to 2008?"
Powerball has been doing tests since at least October 2002.
"Most randomized sequences do not have an easily recognizable pattern"
It's easy for all of us to fall into part of the same trap. People tend to think of patterns in terms of some find of repetition, but every result has a distinctive pattern.
"Yet any one specific arbitrary sequence has exactly the same chance of occurring as any other."
As near as I can tell a lot of people here don't understand that at all. They look at a particular string of events and attach an arbitrary significance to it, such as 6 heads in a row, and seem to have absolutely have no clue that it's got exactly the same probability as any other possible result.
"How is it possible to avoid countering person's A's assessment to go after person B's when they're both saying the same thing?"
If you all were saying exactly the same thing there wouldn't be any point in countering each particular instance of it, would there? You and particularly Amber just have more of a knack for saying things that are utterly ridiculous or downright stupid. grwurston doesn't seem to have any idea of what the relative probabilities of different events are, but I don't recall seeing them make a ridiculous claim that a perfectly fair coin suddenly becomes unfair and develops a magical preference because of some particular string of results.