Here is a good exercise that helps us understand random numbers and … that also shows why gamblers lose money.
It comes from Alex Bellos who wrote Alex’s Adventures in Numberland (Bloomsbury) with some additions by Mathspig.
1. Ask each member of the class to guess, then write down on a piece of paper the result they imagine for tossing a coin 30 times .
2. Now ask them to actually toss a coin 30 times recording the result.
3. Then ask them to toss the coin one more time. Students who throw Heads will write their first results on the board. And tails their second results.
4. Finally, see if the class can guess which is which, and calculate the probability of getting those guesses right.
As Alex Bellos explains, we humans try and impose order on chaos. Our imagined results show a pattern. The real results are more… well, random. The problem is when we write HH we then think it must be Ts turn. It doesn’t matter how many Hs appear in a row, the probablity for the next flip producing a H is still 1:2. Therefore the random results for tossing a coin can have any number of Hs or Ts together!!!!!!!!!!! The longest recorded run for Black on the roulette wheel was 26. See an earlier mathspig post, The Wheel on the Roulette Table went round and round, round and round.
See if you can pick which of the following results A, B, C or D was guesswork. The other three are real coin flip results.
In fact, A was the guess.
Gamblers constantly think it’s time for a particular number to be drawn in loot or for a machine to pay out. And they are wrong. Sooooooo wrong……. This is called the gambler’s fallacy. More @ Prevent Gambling Addiction
DO YOU THINK GAMBLERS ARE LOSERS?
DO THE MATHS!!!!
Look at these Las Vegas Casinos …. This has all been paid for by LOSERS….
This …..The Excalibur Hotel Casino (below)
And this …New York, New York Hotel Casino
And this …The Luxor Hotel Casino
And this … The Venetian Casino
Are you feeling lucky, punk? Don’t bet on it!!!!!
On the other hand, a maths genius might not need luck. See Maths Makes Money post (following).
Business partners David Walsh (top, left) and Zeljko Ranogajec(bottom, left) make millions from maths. They employ many mathematicians to constantly calculate probabilities – OK – odds, and gamble worldwide. But this is BIG time gambling.
From being thrown out of Tasmania’s Wrest Point Casino in the 1980s for counting cards in Blackjack, these partners are now believed to be the BIGGEST GAMBLERS in the world.
According to the HERALD SUN (February 13, 2010)- Mathspig was a columnist with Herald Sun 18 years -
it is believed that Zeljko ‘accounts for 6-8 per cent of Tabcorp’s $10 billion Australian betting turnover or $600-800 million and bets tens of millions more with local bookmakers.
But that is just the start. Once the overseas betting turnover of his 24-hour, seven-day-a-week operation is taken into account, his total annual spend globally is believed to be well over $1 billion.‘
If you think this is just gossip, David Walsh has spent over $180 million on his hobby, art collection. He has just opened MONA, the Museum for Old and New Art, involving $100 million worth of exquisite art housed in an $80 million architectural masterpiece outside Hobart, Tasmania. It is a state-of-the-art Art museum. iPods using GPS guide visitors through the museum. It is FREE to the public. More at The Mercury.
Here are some pictures of the museum and the art.
MONA, Tasmania
Erwin Wurm’s Fat Car
iTune Screen MONA
The Last Riot Mona
How do you beat the odds?
One way is to buy all possible outcomes in a lottery.
There is a lot of maths in backpacks. We’ll start with simple angles.
Students can also look at the design of the backpack to lower the Centre of Gravity, reduce pressure on shoulders and look cool as well as methods of packing the backpack to increase stability.
Karate chopping the end off a wooden school ruler has always been a classroom sport.
To karate chop a ruler the following equation applies:
Now we can have some fun, mathspigs.
We will do some calcs to compare the force, F, required to karate chop a piece off a wooden ruler staring at 10cm length and working back to shorter and shorter lengths. These calcs also work in inches.
But when you karate chop a ruler you hold one end down with you other hand. So what is the ideal point on the ruler to act as the fulcrum for easiest karate chop force? You can find more information on levers at the Robinson Library.
You can, surprisingly, use a piece of newspaper to hold the ruler in place. Check it out atKingsford School.
Kids often threaten to spit on other kids with spit globs, pips or mushed up paper. How far should a kid stand back from the spitter?
Spit will travel in a parabola EXCEPT into or with the windor out the window of a traveling car………
Look at the parabola. To have the spit glob travel further the spitter should aim up in the air!!!
You’ve been warned.
The Guinness Book World Record for spitting a Watermelon Pip stands at stands 68 feet and 9 1/8 inches or 20.96m and was set by Lee Wheells of Luling in 1989.
If you think this is all for fun, you are dead wrong mister. Watermelon spitting in Luling is serious business. There are official seed-spitting songs and yells: “Come on everybody, take a look, (insert name) gonna spit into the record book….”
Teachers hate kids leaning back on chairs for a good reason.
They may not lose their head, but they could lose a few brain cells if they fall. It’s all to do with angles, but I suggest you use an empty chair or, if you like Myth Busters, perhaps you could use a dummy.
This is not a dummy.
The Centre of Gravity rules for stability apply to a person sitting in a chair is the same way the rules apply to a kid with a backpack.
For more information this is a cool GCSE Physics link using Batman and Centre of Gravity.
This is a really cool school chair trick. The image may not appear on your iPad.
You need brains to make paper planes. The work involves symmetry and also aerodynamics.
Now Mathspig recommends paper planes making as a Friday Maths Madness activity.
Put a waste paper bin on the front desk and every time students finish a problem or a set of problems they can write their name and answer(s) on a paper and fold it into a paper plane and aim it into the bin.
The most correct answers IN THE BIN wins a prize!!!!
Here is a good exercise that helps us understand random numbers and … that also shows why gamblers lose money.
