For example, when I flip a coin, I have a 1/2 chance of getting head, and the same chance at getting tails. With that theory, if I toss a coin 50 times, I should get 25 heads, and 25 tails.
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However, I did 3 rounds of 50 coin flips, with results of:
1. 28 heads, 22 tails
2. 27 heads, 23 tails
3. 27 heads, 23 tails.
I assumed that perhaps the coins weren’t “true”. Maybe the sides are waited different, maybe I tossed with different height/force each time. So I went virtual, and switched to having a computer roll a dice.
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I should have a 1/6 chance at rolling a number between 1-6. So 60 rolls, should have each number come up 10 times. But in practice my results were:
1. 14
2. 9
3. 8
4. 13
5. 6
6. 10
So how come practice/reality, doesn’t align with theory, even when we take human error out of the equation?
In: 34
Theoretical probability DOES align with practice. The problem is you’re misattributing something to theoretical probability that it doesn’t say itself.
It should be obvious if you flip a coin twice, you are not guaranteed to get 1 heads and 1 tails, as you can also get 2 heads or 2 tails. As obvious as this may sound, you cannot guarantee what a coin is going to land on. Since you cannot guarantee the outcome of the coin flip, you can’t guarantee the outcome of multiple coin flips. Thus, you can’t guarantee 25 heads and 25 tails.
Probability can only tell you how likely something is to happen. It cannot tell you what will happen (barring a 100% or 0% probability).
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