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submitted 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) by Devgard@lemmy.world to c/showerthoughts@lemmy.world

If you're lucky in one area, what's the chance that you'll be lucky in another?Instead, it should be those who are really unlucky, the lottery might balance out their luck ๐Ÿ’€

edit: I forgot about ~~mutually exclusive~~ independent events probability ty everyone

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[-] AlmightySnoo@lemmy.world 14 points 8 months ago

Probability theory to the rescue:

Assume you have two binary variables X and Y. X is equal to 1 if you're sick, 0 otherwise. Y is equal to 1 if you win the lottery, 0 otherwise.

Your question implicitly asks what the probability of winning would be given that you're not sick. By definition that would be:

p = P("X=0" and "Y=1") / P("X=0")

And you're stuck with the "X=0" and "Y=1" event as you need some knowledge about how X and Y are related to each other.

In other words, does your health have any effect on how the lottery machine works? Or vice versa, does the lottery machine impact your health? As the answer to both is obviously no (as there's no physically possible way that could be true, unless you believe in the paranormal and there being some god who plays around with the probabilities), it's reasonable to assume that X and Y are independent, in which case P("X=0" and "Y=1") = P("X=0") * P("Y=1"), but then this simply means that p = P("Y=1"), ie your health doesn't matter: whether you're healthy or sick, that doesn't change the probability of you winning the lottery.

[-] Rhynoplaz@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago

1 or 0. Odds are 50/50. Got it.

this post was submitted on 29 Sep 2023
-20 points (32.1% liked)

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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The best ones are thoughts that many people can relate to and they find something funny or interesting in regular stuff.

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