I mentioned to a colleague that I’d bought two lottery tickets for last weeks Euromillions draw instead of my usual 1 to double my chance at winning. He said “Yeah, that’s not how it works.” I’m sure he is right – but why?
In: 7847
Your coworker mixes 2 different types of chance.
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There is the lottery where there is a fixed amount of combinations with a fixed chance. Buying multiple different combinations increase your chances linearly
For example 5 number out of 90 without repetition, means 90*89*88*87*86. Every thicket has a chance of 1 in 5273912160. Two ticket 2 times, 10 ticket, 10 times and so on
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There is a different chance, where the chances don’t increase linearly. When you want something to happen certainly out of a given number of tries. Those are the relations of the same chances over and over.
For example, the chance of you throw 6 with cube dice is 1/6. That is linear, but if you throw it multiple times and you want to be certain that you are going to get a six, then the increasing the number of throws don’t increase your chances linearly.,
I can’t find the equation…. I don’t know how it is called properly in english
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Back to lottery, If you look at a single lottery draw, buying multiple tickets increase your chances linearly with each ticket, to win that lottery
But if you look at multiple lottery draws, buying tickets in each don’t increase your chances linearly to win the lottery anytime.
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maybe it is the binominal distribution
Where the attempts multiply each other.
If you have 1% chance to succeed out of 100 trys, first time you have 1% chance second try 1.99
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