Flipping a tail is a 1/2 chance, but flipping 6 tails in a row is a 1/64, so if after flipping 5 tails, why is it incorrect to say that your chance of flipping another tail is now lower, like you’re “bound” to get a head? I know this is the gambler’s fallacy, but why is it a fallacy? I get that each coin flip is independent, but it feels right (as fallacies often do) that in consecutive flips the previous events matter? Please, help me see it in a different way.
In: Mathematics
Let’s say you flip five tails in a row and then drop the coin on the ground and lose it. A week later, somebody finds the coin and flips it. What are their odds of getting tails? 50/50, right? Why? Because the coin doesn’t store luck. It doesn’t store luck over the course of a week and a change of ownership and it doesn’t store luck over the couple of seconds that it takes to flip it again. They’re independent events.
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