I know, 50/50 heads tails right? But help me understand the next step – each coin flip has a 50/50 shot of heads or tails. What I don’t understand is how the likelihood of the next flip doesn’t change. For example if I flipped a coin 10 times and every time it flipped heads, the next flip would be 50/50 tails. Wouldn’t the likelihood of flipping a coin 11 times and having it be heads every time be really low? 0.5^11 = 0.048%?
Here’s the origin of the question. I was at a roulette table and the guy said “it’s been black the last 8 rolls, the next one has to be red.” At first I thought, the next roll will be ~47% black, ~47 red, ~6% 0 or 00 you fucking imbecile. Then I thought to myself, what are the chances that there are no red rolls in 9 rolls, which is well below 1%.
Am I the imbecile?
In: 215
The reason the probability does not change is the coin does not have a memory. How it lands will be a result of how exactly you throw it and with a well-balanced coin both sides have equal probability. You can’t control how you throw the coin to get hea or tails.
It could be the case that if the count is not balanced or someone have a coin with a head on both sides. So cheating is always a possibility
You can change it to 100 people in a row that flip a coin without showing the result or anyone else. There is not reason that the result of one person depends on the result of the people around them.
Instead of flipping the coin 10 times, you can ask the 10 first people in the line their results.
One thing to consider when you talk about probability went the question is asked.
If you ask it before you start then it is very unlikely that you get 11 heads in a row. But if you ask the question after you have got 10 heads in a row the chance of getting another one the change is 50/50.
The Unlikely 10 heads in a row has already happened. The probability for what did happen is 1.
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