Selecting Lotto numbers

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eracode

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#2113729 25-Oct-2018 11:36

Zepanda66:
I wonder if the time of the ticket purchase comes into play at all? i.e its it better if you buy the ticket a few days before the draw vs 5 minutes before ticket sale closes?

Of course - those ‘in the know’ are aware that if you buy 25 hours, 25 mins and 25 secs before the draw, you can slightly increase your odds - but that’s all you need. That’s why there’s so many people buying on Friday evenings, on their way home from work. But keep this to yourself - we don’t want everyone knowing about it.

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#2113751 25-Oct-2018 12:12

elpenguino:

Batman:

elpenguino:

Batman:

yup stats and wikipedia all you want, auckland woman won lotto twice in 5 months.

what I'm saying is, you can't science luck.

Yes you can: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Probability

If you want to have any rational basis for winning at gambling you need to understand probability.

Probability theory and practice are the same in theory, but not in practice.

Please give example(s).

Otherwise nobody would purchase insurance. I presume you do travel overseas, and that you over time, purchase at least 3 types of insurance?

I didn't use to bother with things like insurance so much when I was younger but now I have kids to look after I do. It's an emotional thing, as many things to do with humans are.

Well maybe you don't understand insurance. Insurance and lottery are the same thing.

I didn't try to find the best wiki to explain it but maybe google "insurance and lottery".

elpenguino

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#2113765 25-Oct-2018 12:19

Batman:

elpenguino:

Batman:

elpenguino:

Batman:

yup stats and wikipedia all you want, auckland woman won lotto twice in 5 months.

what I'm saying is, you can't science luck.

Yes you can: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Probability

If you want to have any rational basis for winning at gambling you need to understand probability.

Probability theory and practice are the same in theory, but not in practice.

Please give example(s).

Otherwise nobody would purchase insurance. I presume you do travel overseas, and that you over time, purchase at least 3 types of insurance?

I didn't use to bother with things like insurance so much when I was younger but now I have kids to look after I do. It's an emotional thing, as many things to do with humans are.

Well maybe you don't understand insurance. Insurance and lottery are the same thing.

I didn't try to find the best wiki to explain it but maybe google "insurance and lottery".

i think I've got the basic gist of how insurance works.

You need to back up your statement above with an argument.

Most of the posters in this thread are just like chimpanzees on MDMA, full of feelings of bonhomie, joy, and optimism. Fred99 8/4/21

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#2113773 25-Oct-2018 12:31

Batman:

... Insurance and lottery are the same thing.

I didn't try to find the best wiki to explain it but maybe google "insurance and lottery".

Well, that's a bag of wind. A grand statement backed up by ... wait for it ... nothing in particular.

The closest statement I could agree to is that "insurance can be like a lottery". It is much easier to find information on that, e.g. the first link I found:

http://thefederalist.com/2016/04/27/why-health-insurance-is-like-playing-the-lottery/

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#2113898 25-Oct-2018 15:52

A poorly worded post on geekzone does not alter mathematical facts.

insurance and lottery are the same things, mathematically speaking

But some people love to buy lottery tickets and don't want to buy insurance. Whereas some people laugh at those who buy lottery tickets yet they would happily buy insurance themselves. I'm not saying anyone is wrong, but both are in fact products based on the same principles of statistics and math.

elpenguino

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#2113902 25-Oct-2018 15:58

Batman: A poorly worded post on geekzone does not alter mathematical facts.

insurance and lottery are the same things, mathematically speaking

But some people love to buy lottery tickets and don't want to buy insurance. Whereas some people laugh at those who buy lottery tickets yet they would happily buy insurance themselves. I'm not saying anyone is wrong, but both are in fact products based on the same principles of statistics and math.

I'm more interested in your assertion Probability theory and practice are the same in theory, but not in practice.

if you believe it ( and understand it ) back it up with examples to explain it otherwise I'll carry on assuming it's waffle.

Most of the posters in this thread are just like chimpanzees on MDMA, full of feelings of bonhomie, joy, and optimism. Fred99 8/4/21

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Hammerer

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#2114012 25-Oct-2018 18:27

Batman: A poorly worded post on geekzone does not alter mathematical facts.

insurance and lottery are the same things, mathematically speaking

That's an important qualification "mathematically speaking" to add to the bald statement "Well maybe you don't understand insurance. Insurance and lottery are the same thing." But that's still not a sufficient qualification to make them the same thing, even mathematically.

Mathematics does not claim that "insurance and lottery are the same things". The claim would be that particular problems are resolvable using the same principles. I think that is what you mean but that is not the same as what you are saying.

In mathematics, there is some concern for the outcome. Sign and magnitude are relevant which is why they aren't the same result. In any year, general insurance normally leaves us with a small loss (insurance premium) even for the "winning" outcome (premium plus claim excess) whereas the lottery has a very rare momentous profit to offset the many small losses.

Batman: ...

But some people love to buy lottery tickets and don't want to buy insurance. Whereas some people laugh at those who buy lottery tickets yet they would happily buy insurance themselves. I'm not saying anyone is wrong, but both are in fact products based on the same principles of statistics and math.

I also think that you are talking about something else, given your statements comparing the buyers of each product. The paradox addressed by Prospect Theory, or Cumulative Prospect Theory as it used to be called, is that some people buy both insurance and lottery tickets. It doesn't say that both are the same. It says that they are not so why do people buy both.

https://patrickjuli.us/2015/02/08/prospect-theory-why-we-buy-insurance-and-lottery-tickets/

What was that argument? People buy both insurance and lottery tickets.

The “both” is very important. Buying insurance can definitely be rational—indeed, typically is. Buying lottery tickets could theoretically be rational, under very particular circumstances. But they cannot both be rational at the same time.

But even if you were thinking about Prospect Theory, then you're arguing something different because you've brought in the situation where people who buy insurance "laugh at those who buy lottery tickets". Buying insurance is easily shown to be a rational sharing of risks (between insured and insurer) so both parties end up better off in the long run. Not so with a lottery.

https://dqydj.com/the-lottery-insurance-paradox/

Why would a rational person purchase insurance yet also play the lottery? Today, we discuss the lottery-insurance paradox.

... Think about it, a lottery is the exact opposite of insurance. When it comes to insurance, a person purchases coverage to hedge against risks. In a lottery, sums are spent for a long-shot chance at the ‘risk’ of a payoff. People are risk-seeking when it comes to playing the lottery yet risk-averse when it comes to purchasing insurance. What gives?

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#2114264 26-Oct-2018 09:49

Planet Money (a US podcast) repeated an episode on lotteries this week, first broadcast a couple of years back (assuming it was repeated because of the big US draw this week). Part of it was a really interesting segment on Stefan Mandel, an economist from Romania, who won a lottery 14 times including in his homeland, Australia and the US.

His method involved purchasing every single combination of numbers, something he reckons wouldn't be feasible now. Apparently, in response to his success, Australian law was amended to stop others using the same method!

Well worth a listen - https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2018/10/23/659818948/episode-676-the-first-lottery-how-to-beat-the-odds

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