Riddle me this!

If your topic has nothing to do with Spyderco, you can post it here.
User avatar
Surfingringo
Member
Posts: 5818
Joined: Sun Sep 01, 2013 2:02 pm
Location: Costa Rica

Re: Riddle me this!

#81

Post by Surfingringo »

Here is one other example that helps. Let’s say you are watching two guys, Joe and Tom, play a card game. They are drawing cards to see who can get the highest card (which they have agreed is the ace of spades). Joe draws one card and Tom draws the other 51. Before they play their cards, Tom has the opportunity to LOOK AT his 51 cards and throw away the 50 that he doesn’t want and keep the 1 that he is going to play. Now that each one has only one card, they are ready to reveal them to see who wins? Assuming you are aware of everything that happened, which player would you bet on? Which is more likely to have the ace of spades? Or would it be 50/50 since they both have one card at that point?

See it now? You can’t ignore the events that led to them each having one card (or door). I mean, you can, but the laws of statistics do not. And if you are still unsure, you can do the actual test like Tangent said and the results will prove what we are saying. Trust me, I know because I had to do it at one point to solidify the idea in my own mind. Haha. And don’t feel silly that this one took a minute. There have been much brighter minds than ours that have argued the case you are making...but they were confused...by a beautiful riddle. :)
User avatar
Pelagic
Member
Posts: 2440
Joined: Fri Apr 27, 2018 5:49 pm
Location: East Coast/Nomadic

Re: Riddle me this!

#82

Post by Pelagic »

In the card game, no cards are being eliminated. If Tom revealed 50 of the cards face up, Joe would be left with a 50/50 (if you ignored the fact that he'd actually know which card it was due to process of elimination). That's where I'm hung up. But I'm not really interested in understanding it. The hockey puck riddle is much more intriguing.
Pancake wrote:
Wed Aug 14, 2019 10:20 pm
Are you a magician? :eek:
Nate wrote:
Thu Apr 04, 2019 4:32 pm
You're the lone wolf of truth howling into the winds of ignorance
Doeswhateveraspidercan wrote:
Sat Jun 15, 2019 9:17 pm
You are a nobody got it?
User avatar
Surfingringo
Member
Posts: 5818
Joined: Sun Sep 01, 2013 2:02 pm
Location: Costa Rica

Re: Riddle me this!

#83

Post by Surfingringo »

Fair enough. If we ever end up in a casino and someone is playing this game then you can bet on the guy that draws one card and I’ll take the guy who has 51. It will probably work out 50/50 like you are imagining. Bring your ATM card just in case though. :p

Clearly I’m being a smartass (hopefully in good fun). Like I said, it is a great riddle. I’ll leave it be though since you’re clearly over it. :D The hockey pucks is a very doable puzzle. Once you figure out the basic technique you have to use then it’s just grinding out the sequence of manipulations.
User avatar
Pelagic
Member
Posts: 2440
Joined: Fri Apr 27, 2018 5:49 pm
Location: East Coast/Nomadic

Re: Riddle me this!

#84

Post by Pelagic »

One last look.

3 doors. One has a prize. You pick door 1, and I reveal that door 3 does NOT have the prize. This leaves only doors 1 and 2, a coin flip. I ask you if you want to switch your choice, and somehow this will allow you to flip the metaphorical coin but with 2/3 probability of guessing correctly.

Does the "Do you want to switch?" mean something different than what it seems?

Maybe you'd want to switch from choosing door 1 to door 2, but that doesn't change your odds.

Maybe you mean switching from door 1 to choosing doors 2 AND 3? but since 3 doesn't have the prize, it's still a coin flip between 1 and 2.

Maybe by switching you mean they get to choose doors 1 AND 2? But that would be a 100% chance of choosing the prize.

Or maybe, it's all a lie/trick and you actually don't know anything about door 3 after the man SUPPOSEDLY reveals that there is no prize behind door 3. So if you ignore that part, and he actually allows you to switch your choice from door 1 to doors 2 AND 3, and you take his offer, you truly DO have a 2/3 chance of getting the prize. Very strange, but that would explain the 2/3 chance.
Pancake wrote:
Wed Aug 14, 2019 10:20 pm
Are you a magician? :eek:
Nate wrote:
Thu Apr 04, 2019 4:32 pm
You're the lone wolf of truth howling into the winds of ignorance
Doeswhateveraspidercan wrote:
Sat Jun 15, 2019 9:17 pm
You are a nobody got it?
tangent
Member
Posts: 374
Joined: Fri Sep 19, 2008 10:59 pm
Location: Southern California

Re: Riddle me this!

#85

Post by tangent »

Surfingringo wrote:
Sat Sep 07, 2019 5:58 am
Fair enough. If we ever end up in a casino and someone is playing this game then you can bet on the guy that draws one card and I’ll take the guy who has 51. It will probably work out 50/50 like you are imagining. Bring your ATM card just in case though. :p

Clearly I’m being a smartass (hopefully in good fun). Like I said, it is a great riddle. I’ll leave it be though since you’re clearly over it. :D The hockey pucks is a very doable puzzle. Once you figure out the basic technique you have to use then it’s just grinding out the sequence of manipulations.
Wow, Lance...those are some good examples that you just gave. If someone doesn't understand the concept with those examples, it might not be in their wheelhouse to understand. Anyway...nicely done. ;)
User avatar
Pelagic
Member
Posts: 2440
Joined: Fri Apr 27, 2018 5:49 pm
Location: East Coast/Nomadic

Re: Riddle me this!

#86

Post by Pelagic »

tangent wrote:
Sun Sep 08, 2019 2:44 pm
Surfingringo wrote:
Sat Sep 07, 2019 5:58 am
Fair enough. If we ever end up in a casino and someone is playing this game then you can bet on the guy that draws one card and I’ll take the guy who has 51. It will probably work out 50/50 like you are imagining. Bring your ATM card just in case though. :p

Clearly I’m being a smartass (hopefully in good fun). Like I said, it is a great riddle. I’ll leave it be though since you’re clearly over it. :D The hockey pucks is a very doable puzzle. Once you figure out the basic technique you have to use then it’s just grinding out the sequence of manipulations.
Wow, Lance...those are some good examples that you just gave. If someone doesn't understand the concept with those examples, it might not be in their wheelhouse to understand. Anyway...nicely done. ;)
While I'm no math professor, it WAS in my wheelhouse to get a 780 on SAT math and ace both statistics courses I took at UNC. Unless you provide a clear AND relevant example as to why someone could have a 2/3 chance of winning a coin toss, then no, I will not understand. Because it seems like total hogwash. Explain it better. Don't just tell me to try it. I could tell you a coin toss does not have 50/50 odds, and back it up by saying "flip a coin a thousand times, I bet you won't get heads 500 times!" but it would be a nonsensical explanation.

3 doors, one prize. One gets eliminated. That leaves 2 doors, one prize. What is behind either door is unknown. Definition of a 50/50.
Pancake wrote:
Wed Aug 14, 2019 10:20 pm
Are you a magician? :eek:
Nate wrote:
Thu Apr 04, 2019 4:32 pm
You're the lone wolf of truth howling into the winds of ignorance
Doeswhateveraspidercan wrote:
Sat Jun 15, 2019 9:17 pm
You are a nobody got it?
User avatar
Surfingringo
Member
Posts: 5818
Joined: Sun Sep 01, 2013 2:02 pm
Location: Costa Rica

Re: Riddle me this!

#87

Post by Surfingringo »

Ok, one more example. You have 100 doors and one of them has a prize. You select a door. The host then gives you a chance to switch your 1 door for ALL the other 99. Do you switch? Of course you do.

Now lets add one more step in. This time you also get to select 1 door. There is a 1% chance you have the door with the prize and a 99% chance it is behind one of the other 99. Again, the host asks you if you would like to switch your door for the other 99 but this time he opens 98 of the doors before you confirm your decision. Even though there are only 2 unopened doors at this point you still have a 99% chance of winning if you switch. You are still switching your one door for the other 99, it just so happens that 98 of them have already been opened. The KEY here is that the host KNOWS which door the prize is behind. He will ALWAYS open the doors that don’t have the prize and NEVER open the door that has the prize. So 99 times out of a hundred, the prize will be in that set of 99 doors and the host will open all of them except for the one with the prize. So if you switch to the one that is unopened then you will have a 99% chance of winning.

As a separate example imagine that you chose one and there were 99 that were not chosen. If you randomly opened the doors of that group nand through sheer chance managed to open 98 of them without finding the prize then you would be left with two doors. The one you chose and the one that remains from the 99. At that point the odds would be 50/50. It is the hosts knowledge of the location of the prize that removes the random chance from the scenario and completely changes the odds.
tangent
Member
Posts: 374
Joined: Fri Sep 19, 2008 10:59 pm
Location: Southern California

Re: Riddle me this!

#88

Post by tangent »

Pelagic wrote:
Sun Sep 08, 2019 3:33 pm
tangent wrote:
Sun Sep 08, 2019 2:44 pm
Surfingringo wrote:
Sat Sep 07, 2019 5:58 am
Fair enough. If we ever end up in a casino and someone is playing this game then you can bet on the guy that draws one card and I’ll take the guy who has 51. It will probably work out 50/50 like you are imagining. Bring your ATM card just in case though. :p

Clearly I’m being a smartass (hopefully in good fun). Like I said, it is a great riddle. I’ll leave it be though since you’re clearly over it. :D The hockey pucks is a very doable puzzle. Once you figure out the basic technique you have to use then it’s just grinding out the sequence of manipulations.
Wow, Lance...those are some good examples that you just gave. If someone doesn't understand the concept with those examples, it might not be in their wheelhouse to understand. Anyway...nicely done. ;)
While I'm no math professor, it WAS in my wheelhouse to get a 780 on SAT math and ace both statistics courses I took at UNC. Unless you provide a clear AND relevant example as to why someone could have a 2/3 chance of winning a coin toss, then no, I will not understand. Because it seems like total hogwash. Explain it better. Don't just tell me to try it. I could tell you a coin toss does not have 50/50 odds, and back it up by saying "flip a coin a thousand times, I bet you won't get heads 500 times!" but it would be a nonsensical explanation.

3 doors, one prize. One gets eliminated. That leaves 2 doors, one prize. What is behind either door is unknown. Definition of a 50/50.
It's been explained to you in as clear a way as possible...I meant no offense. A 780 on the SAT in math is great...but this requires conceptual understanding, not just computational literacy. Lance just gave another great explanation (above). I don't know what else to add at this point...I asked you to try a simple experiment because sometimes when a theory doesn't make sense to us on paper, we become believers when we actually see the theoretical probability play out in experimental practice.

Cheers
User avatar
Pelagic
Member
Posts: 2440
Joined: Fri Apr 27, 2018 5:49 pm
Location: East Coast/Nomadic

Re: Riddle me this!

#89

Post by Pelagic »

Surfingringo wrote:
Sun Sep 08, 2019 7:06 pm
Ok, one more example. You have 100 doors and one of them has a prize. You select a door. The host then gives you a chance to switch your 1 door for ALL the other 99. Do you switch? Of course you do.

Now lets add one more step in. This time you also get to select 1 door. There is a 1% chance you have the door with the prize and a 99% chance it is behind one of the other 99. Again, the host asks you if you would like to switch your door for the other 99 but this time he opens 98 of the doors before you confirm your decision. Even though there are only 2 unopened doors at this point you still have a 99% chance of winning if you switch. You are still switching your one door for the other 99, it just so happens that 98 of them have already been opened. The KEY here is that the host KNOWS which door the prize is behind. He will ALWAYS open the doors that don’t have the prize and NEVER open the door that has the prize. So 99 times out of a hundred, the prize will be in that set of 99 doors and the host will open all of them except for the one with the prize. So if you switch to the one that is unopened then you will have a 99% chance of winning.

As a separate example imagine that you chose one and there were 99 that were not chosen. If you randomly opened the doors of that group nand through sheer chance managed to open 98 of them without finding the prize then you would be left with two doors. The one you chose and the one that remains from the 99. At that point the odds would be 50/50. It is the hosts knowledge of the location of the prize that removes the random chance from the scenario and completely changes the odds.
Thank you for taking the time. I get it now.

It is based on the assumed trickery of the host of the game show. But it seems weird that his tactics are pre-determined. More mind games go into your average rock/paper/scissors match than what is assumed of the host. I'm mostly the type of person to not read into (at least not too much) when someone says something to try to trick me. You could think about it all day.

"Is he asking me if I want to switch because I have chosen the correct door?"

"Is he asking me if I want to switch because he simply wants to play with my mind?"

"Does he always ask this question to contestants (is this standard practice)?"

"Is he using reverse psychology on me, or reverse-reverse psychology? How many steps ahead of me does he believe he is?"

"Is he asking the question in such a way that he believes he will cause me to keep my current choice?"

"Is he asking me the question in such a way that he believes he will cause me to switch my choice?"

It goes on and on. You can analyze a situation much better in person based on the demeanor, body language, speech, etc. of the host and at least attempt to make a more educated guess than if you are looking at this situation on paper. In the absence of all these factors I see it as more of a 50/50 and find it strange that human uniqueness is cast by the wayside in favor of "the host is obviously a certain kind of person with one trick up his sleeve." Maybe that explains my mentality better. I'm glad I get the point now but I was hoping for something unexpected and unique in the explanation. Again thanks for taking the time.
tangent wrote:
Pelagic wrote:
Sun Sep 08, 2019 3:33 pm
tangent wrote:
Sun Sep 08, 2019 2:44 pm
Surfingringo wrote:
Sat Sep 07, 2019 5:58 am
Fair enough. If we ever end up in a casino and someone is playing this game then you can bet on the guy that draws one card and I’ll take the guy who has 51. It will probably work out 50/50 like you are imagining. Bring your ATM card just in case though. :p

Clearly I’m being a smartass (hopefully in good fun). Like I said, it is a great riddle. I’ll leave it be though since you’re clearly over it. :D The hockey pucks is a very doable puzzle. Once you figure out the basic technique you have to use then it’s just grinding out the sequence of manipulations.
Wow, Lance...those are some good examples that you just gave. If someone doesn't understand the concept with those examples, it might not be in their wheelhouse to understand. Anyway...nicely done. ;)
While I'm no math professor, it WAS in my wheelhouse to get a 780 on SAT math and ace both statistics courses I took at UNC. Unless you provide a clear AND relevant example as to why someone could have a 2/3 chance of winning a coin toss, then no, I will not understand. Because it seems like total hogwash. Explain it better. Don't just tell me to try it. I could tell you a coin toss does not have 50/50 odds, and back it up by saying "flip a coin a thousand times, I bet you won't get heads 500 times!" but it would be a nonsensical explanation.

3 doors, one prize. One gets eliminated. That leaves 2 doors, one prize. What is behind either door is unknown. Definition of a 50/50.
It's been explained to you in as clear a way as possible...I meant no offense. A 780 on the SAT in math is great...but this requires conceptual understanding, not just computational literacy. Lance just gave another great explanation (above). I don't know what else to add at this point...I asked you to try a simple experiment because sometimes when a theory doesn't make sense to us on paper, we become believers when we actually see the theoretical probability play out in experimental practice.

Cheers
Objectively, that's incorrect. Only a few key sentences of the last explanation were both clear AND relevant to the specifics of the situation depicted in the riddle. I only felt the need to mention a few of my credentials because of 2 previous comments seemed like indirect ways of condescendingly pointing out my supposed lack of critical thinking ability when no relevant explanation had been provided to me. As for the experiment you mentioned, it would be completely different than this one-dimensional riddle. I'd actually be having a personal interaction with an actual human being capable of having more than one trick up their sleeve as well as any amount of vulnerabilities in their tactics. It's almost like online poker vs poker in person (for world class poker players). Not many relevant comparisons can be drawn between the 2. So no conclusions could be drawn from the outcome. Just like I said "flip a coin 1000 times, I bet you won't get heads 500 times!", it is based on a disingenuous premise, as while getting heads 500 times is more likely than any other outcome, it is HIGHLY unlikely that you will get that result. So the result itself would lead the observer astray if they were looking to draw quick conclusions based on the outcome. Hopefully that illustrates some of my many concerns with the legitimacy of that experiment.
Pancake wrote:
Wed Aug 14, 2019 10:20 pm
Are you a magician? :eek:
Nate wrote:
Thu Apr 04, 2019 4:32 pm
You're the lone wolf of truth howling into the winds of ignorance
Doeswhateveraspidercan wrote:
Sat Jun 15, 2019 9:17 pm
You are a nobody got it?
tangent
Member
Posts: 374
Joined: Fri Sep 19, 2008 10:59 pm
Location: Southern California

Re: Riddle me this!

#90

Post by tangent »

Pelagic wrote:
Mon Sep 09, 2019 3:33 am
Surfingringo wrote:
Sun Sep 08, 2019 7:06 pm
Ok, one more example. You have 100 doors and one of them has a prize. You select a door. The host then gives you a chance to switch your 1 door for ALL the other 99. Do you switch? Of course you do.

Now lets add one more step in. This time you also get to select 1 door. There is a 1% chance you have the door with the prize and a 99% chance it is behind one of the other 99. Again, the host asks you if you would like to switch your door for the other 99 but this time he opens 98 of the doors before you confirm your decision. Even though there are only 2 unopened doors at this point you still have a 99% chance of winning if you switch. You are still switching your one door for the other 99, it just so happens that 98 of them have already been opened. The KEY here is that the host KNOWS which door the prize is behind. He will ALWAYS open the doors that don’t have the prize and NEVER open the door that has the prize. So 99 times out of a hundred, the prize will be in that set of 99 doors and the host will open all of them except for the one with the prize. So if you switch to the one that is unopened then you will have a 99% chance of winning.

As a separate example imagine that you chose one and there were 99 that were not chosen. If you randomly opened the doors of that group nand through sheer chance managed to open 98 of them without finding the prize then you would be left with two doors. The one you chose and the one that remains from the 99. At that point the odds would be 50/50. It is the hosts knowledge of the location of the prize that removes the random chance from the scenario and completely changes the odds.
Thank you for taking the time. I get it now.

It is based on the assumed trickery of the host of the game show. But it seems weird that his tactics are pre-determined. More mind games go into your average rock/paper/scissors match than what is assumed of the host. I'm mostly the type of person to not read into (at least not too much) when someone says something to try to trick me. You could think about it all day.

"Is he asking me if I want to switch because I have chosen the correct door?"

"Is he asking me if I want to switch because he simply wants to play with my mind?"

"Does he always ask this question to contestants (is this standard practice)?"

"Is he using reverse psychology on me, or reverse-reverse psychology? How many steps ahead of me does he believe he is?"

"Is he asking the question in such a way that he believes he will cause me to keep my current choice?"

"Is he asking me the question in such a way that he believes he will cause me to switch my choice?"

It goes on and on. You can analyze a situation much better in person based on the demeanor, body language, speech, etc. of the host and at least attempt to make a more educated guess than if you are looking at this situation on paper. In the absence of all these factors I see it as more of a 50/50 and find it strange that human uniqueness is cast by the wayside in favor of "the host is obviously a certain kind of person with one trick up his sleeve." Maybe that explains my mentality better. I'm glad I get the point now but I was hoping for something unexpected and unique in the explanation. Again thanks for taking the time.
tangent wrote:
Pelagic wrote:
Sun Sep 08, 2019 3:33 pm
tangent wrote:
Sun Sep 08, 2019 2:44 pm


Wow, Lance...those are some good examples that you just gave. If someone doesn't understand the concept with those examples, it might not be in their wheelhouse to understand. Anyway...nicely done. ;)
While I'm no math professor, it WAS in my wheelhouse to get a 780 on SAT math and ace both statistics courses I took at UNC. Unless you provide a clear AND relevant example as to why someone could have a 2/3 chance of winning a coin toss, then no, I will not understand. Because it seems like total hogwash. Explain it better. Don't just tell me to try it. I could tell you a coin toss does not have 50/50 odds, and back it up by saying "flip a coin a thousand times, I bet you won't get heads 500 times!" but it would be a nonsensical explanation.

3 doors, one prize. One gets eliminated. That leaves 2 doors, one prize. What is behind either door is unknown. Definition of a 50/50.
It's been explained to you in as clear a way as possible...I meant no offense. A 780 on the SAT in math is great...but this requires conceptual understanding, not just computational literacy. Lance just gave another great explanation (above). I don't know what else to add at this point...I asked you to try a simple experiment because sometimes when a theory doesn't make sense to us on paper, we become believers when we actually see the theoretical probability play out in experimental practice.

Cheers
Objectively, that's incorrect. Only a few key sentences of the last explanation were both clear AND relevant to the specifics of the situation depicted in the riddle. I only felt the need to mention a few of my credentials because of 2 previous comments seemed like indirect ways of condescendingly pointing out my supposed lack of critical thinking ability when no relevant explanation had been provided to me. As for the experiment you mentioned, it would be completely different than this one-dimensional riddle. I'd actually be having a personal interaction with an actual human being capable of having more than one trick up their sleeve as well as any amount of vulnerabilities in their tactics. It's almost like online poker vs poker in person (for world class poker players). Not many relevant comparisons can be drawn between the 2. So no conclusions could be drawn from the outcome. Just like I said "flip a coin 1000 times, I bet you won't get heads 500 times!", it is based on a disingenuous premise, as while getting heads 500 times is more likely than any other outcome, it is HIGHLY unlikely that you will get that result. So the result itself would lead the observer astray if they were looking to draw quick conclusions based on the outcome. Hopefully that illustrates some of my many concerns with the legitimacy of that experiment.
OK...this is my last post here. What I meant was that if you performed the experiment, you would LIKELY see the probability of success be somewhat close to 2/3 when switching your door. I didn't mean you'd get exactly 2/3 but you would likely get a probability of success that is significantly higher than 1/2. Anyway...sometimes words through the keyboard don't appear on the other side the way that the author intended. I think this may be the case here...again, I meant no disrespect. Cheers.
User avatar
Pelagic
Member
Posts: 2440
Joined: Fri Apr 27, 2018 5:49 pm
Location: East Coast/Nomadic

Re: Riddle me this!

#91

Post by Pelagic »

tangent wrote:
Tue Sep 10, 2019 12:49 pm
Pelagic wrote:
Mon Sep 09, 2019 3:33 am
Surfingringo wrote:
Sun Sep 08, 2019 7:06 pm
Ok, one more example. You have 100 doors and one of them has a prize. You select a door. The host then gives you a chance to switch your 1 door for ALL the other 99. Do you switch? Of course you do.

Now lets add one more step in. This time you also get to select 1 door. There is a 1% chance you have the door with the prize and a 99% chance it is behind one of the other 99. Again, the host asks you if you would like to switch your door for the other 99 but this time he opens 98 of the doors before you confirm your decision. Even though there are only 2 unopened doors at this point you still have a 99% chance of winning if you switch. You are still switching your one door for the other 99, it just so happens that 98 of them have already been opened. The KEY here is that the host KNOWS which door the prize is behind. He will ALWAYS open the doors that don’t have the prize and NEVER open the door that has the prize. So 99 times out of a hundred, the prize will be in that set of 99 doors and the host will open all of them except for the one with the prize. So if you switch to the one that is unopened then you will have a 99% chance of winning.

As a separate example imagine that you chose one and there were 99 that were not chosen. If you randomly opened the doors of that group nand through sheer chance managed to open 98 of them without finding the prize then you would be left with two doors. The one you chose and the one that remains from the 99. At that point the odds would be 50/50. It is the hosts knowledge of the location of the prize that removes the random chance from the scenario and completely changes the odds.
Thank you for taking the time. I get it now.

It is based on the assumed trickery of the host of the game show. But it seems weird that his tactics are pre-determined. More mind games go into your average rock/paper/scissors match than what is assumed of the host. I'm mostly the type of person to not read into (at least not too much) when someone says something to try to trick me. You could think about it all day.

"Is he asking me if I want to switch because I have chosen the correct door?"

"Is he asking me if I want to switch because he simply wants to play with my mind?"

"Does he always ask this question to contestants (is this standard practice)?"

"Is he using reverse psychology on me, or reverse-reverse psychology? How many steps ahead of me does he believe he is?"

"Is he asking the question in such a way that he believes he will cause me to keep my current choice?"

"Is he asking me the question in such a way that he believes he will cause me to switch my choice?"

It goes on and on. You can analyze a situation much better in person based on the demeanor, body language, speech, etc. of the host and at least attempt to make a more educated guess than if you are looking at this situation on paper. In the absence of all these factors I see it as more of a 50/50 and find it strange that human uniqueness is cast by the wayside in favor of "the host is obviously a certain kind of person with one trick up his sleeve." Maybe that explains my mentality better. I'm glad I get the point now but I was hoping for something unexpected and unique in the explanation. Again thanks for taking the time.
tangent wrote:
Pelagic wrote:
Sun Sep 08, 2019 3:33 pm


While I'm no math professor, it WAS in my wheelhouse to get a 780 on SAT math and ace both statistics courses I took at UNC. Unless you provide a clear AND relevant example as to why someone could have a 2/3 chance of winning a coin toss, then no, I will not understand. Because it seems like total hogwash. Explain it better. Don't just tell me to try it. I could tell you a coin toss does not have 50/50 odds, and back it up by saying "flip a coin a thousand times, I bet you won't get heads 500 times!" but it would be a nonsensical explanation.

3 doors, one prize. One gets eliminated. That leaves 2 doors, one prize. What is behind either door is unknown. Definition of a 50/50.
It's been explained to you in as clear a way as possible...I meant no offense. A 780 on the SAT in math is great...but this requires conceptual understanding, not just computational literacy. Lance just gave another great explanation (above). I don't know what else to add at this point...I asked you to try a simple experiment because sometimes when a theory doesn't make sense to us on paper, we become believers when we actually see the theoretical probability play out in experimental practice.

Cheers
Objectively, that's incorrect. Only a few key sentences of the last explanation were both clear AND relevant to the specifics of the situation depicted in the riddle. I only felt the need to mention a few of my credentials because of 2 previous comments seemed like indirect ways of condescendingly pointing out my supposed lack of critical thinking ability when no relevant explanation had been provided to me. As for the experiment you mentioned, it would be completely different than this one-dimensional riddle. I'd actually be having a personal interaction with an actual human being capable of having more than one trick up their sleeve as well as any amount of vulnerabilities in their tactics. It's almost like online poker vs poker in person (for world class poker players). Not many relevant comparisons can be drawn between the 2. So no conclusions could be drawn from the outcome. Just like I said "flip a coin 1000 times, I bet you won't get heads 500 times!", it is based on a disingenuous premise, as while getting heads 500 times is more likely than any other outcome, it is HIGHLY unlikely that you will get that result. So the result itself would lead the observer astray if they were looking to draw quick conclusions based on the outcome. Hopefully that illustrates some of my many concerns with the legitimacy of that experiment.
OK...this is my last post here. What I meant was that if you performed the experiment, you would LIKELY see the probability of success be somewhat close to 2/3 when switching your door. I didn't mean you'd get exactly 2/3 but you would likely get a probability of success that is significantly higher than 1/2. Anyway...sometimes words through the keyboard don't appear on the other side the way that the author intended. I think this may be the case here...again, I meant no disrespect. Cheers.
No problem buddy, we're good.
Pancake wrote:
Wed Aug 14, 2019 10:20 pm
Are you a magician? :eek:
Nate wrote:
Thu Apr 04, 2019 4:32 pm
You're the lone wolf of truth howling into the winds of ignorance
Doeswhateveraspidercan wrote:
Sat Jun 15, 2019 9:17 pm
You are a nobody got it?
User avatar
Pelagic
Member
Posts: 2440
Joined: Fri Apr 27, 2018 5:49 pm
Location: East Coast/Nomadic

Re: Riddle me this!

#92

Post by Pelagic »

DO NOT WATCH THIS VIDEO IF YOU ARE STILL WORKING ON THE HOCKEY PUCK RIDDLE!!!

This gives a long and detailed answer/explanation.

Lance, is this THE answer as you know it?

https://youtu.be/2SfwIwxRupo
Pancake wrote:
Wed Aug 14, 2019 10:20 pm
Are you a magician? :eek:
Nate wrote:
Thu Apr 04, 2019 4:32 pm
You're the lone wolf of truth howling into the winds of ignorance
Doeswhateveraspidercan wrote:
Sat Jun 15, 2019 9:17 pm
You are a nobody got it?
Post Reply