Thoughts: Probabilities

Posted by MahFreenAmeh on Feb. 10, 2006, 5:11 p.m.

I was tlaking to my friends at lunch earlier, and i decided to tell them about one of my theories on Probabilities.

Sure, there are things that have a 3 million in one chance, etc, of happening..

But, any way around, there is only a 50%/50% chance of it actually happening.

That seems logical to me, yet not to them. It can either happen, or not happen.

At any given moment, you can either think about one thing, or not about that one thing, because, it will either not happen, or will happen.

It doesn't matter how improbably it is. It either WILL happen(50% Chance), or WON'T Happen(50% Chance)

Comments

ludamad 18 years, 9 months ago

Not everything has a 50% of happening. If the average age of everyone was 60, would you say everyone was 60? Nothing has a chance of happening that is other than 0 or 100

MahFreenAmeh 18 years, 9 months ago

Ah well. Let's end this argument, before i start making people mad again.

I Agree with you, now, Ludamad… I am starting to see what you are saying.

ludamad 18 years, 9 months ago

Thanks, I was about to continue arguing but I quickly deleted that post.

And what I mean with the quoted thing is that you take a certain group of events, and you average the chances (100 or 0) to form an idea of how likely things with similar attributes are to happen.

DSG 18 years, 9 months ago

both have a chance. period. no percents, no nothing. leave it at that. thats the answer to your question.

firestormx 18 years, 9 months ago

For the record, the probability function, is:

P(A) = n(A) / n(total possible outcomes)

Also, odds and probability aren't really interchangable.

Odds are n(A):n(A')

Probability is n(A) / n(total possible outcomes)

Either way, the only way to have a 50% chance of A occuring, is if the total ammount of outcomes is 2. (Using P(A) anyway…If you use something like P(B | A), etc, then it's possible…)

ludamad 18 years, 9 months ago

Thank you Mr Strom

membrain 18 years, 9 months ago

LoL… so tru, if your speaking of probability on a "per-term" basis…

I live in las vegas, and got very familiar with probability. My conclusion, probability sux! On a side not, playing blackjack profesionaly is not fun o_O

SleepinJohnnyFish 18 years, 9 months ago

you don't average out chances…

if there is either a 100% chance it is happening, or a 0% chance it is happening, that doesn't even out to 50%… the actual number would be the chance of that 100% coming up instead of the 0%, which is why we have odds like 1 in 1 billion in the first place. Therefore, those odds are the actual chances.