in reply to Altruism @ Microsoft
in thread Top goal for 2003

Its great to see that the option to 'Win the Lottery' is coming last (at the moment). I guess the altruism probably comes with the open source movement.

Really? I thought it was because most people here understand how probability works :)

The lottery is basically a tax on the poor. Publicising people who win makes millions dream it could be them. What about publicising things that have a higher chance of happening to you. Every year the odds of certain events happening to you:

Whereas the odds of winning the jackpot in the California Super Lotto Jackpot (for example), are about 18,000,000 to 1.

Sanity Check - what a bummer, eh?

.02

cLive ;-)

Update: To clarify, those stats above are per year, but the lotto odds are per entry, so they are a little screwy, but you get the idea :)

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: Re: Altruism @ Microsoft
by davorg (Chancellor) on Jan 09, 2003 at 14:01 UTC
    The lottery is basically a tax on the poor.

    I like to think of it as a stupidity tax :)

    --
    <http://www.dave.org.uk>

    "The first rule of Perl club is you do not talk about Perl club."
    -- Chip Salzenberg

[reply]
      Im going to go live in the mountains with out any electricity. I will eat wild pigs and dance around the fire. Them I will probably get sick of that and start coding again. Hmm, or I could take that other option and get a life.
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Re: Re: Altruism @ Microsoft
by tretin (Friar) on Jan 09, 2003 at 13:47 UTC
    got me one of them "jobs" so I can help to fund my trip to germany this summer... the hours are going to kill me with school and all, but in the end it will be worth it. I hear German beer is really good.

    work it harder make it better do it faster makes us stronger more than ever hour after our work is never over.
[reply]
      since you'll be in the region go try it all, dutch beer, belgium beer, its all good. its all beer.
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Re: Re: Altruism @ Microsoft
by draper7 (Scribe) on Jan 09, 2003 at 17:14 UTC
      Interesting facts. But I've always wondered how these things are figured.

  • Being struck by lighting and killed (4,210,857 to 1)

      Is this for the whole year or every second of everyday? Does that make any sense?

          --JD      
[reply]

      Aloha,

      The chance depends on so many variables it's barely even worth considering if you're not planning to spend at least week researching it. As with any event, the chance of it occuring is completely dependent on your current situation. A statistic like that is of very little value as it is at best just the number of people in the world divided by the number of people in the world struck by lightning per year. The measurements of which are also highly unreliable..

      That said, take a look at How Likely Are You to Be Struck by Lightning?.

      Aloha

[reply]
      Surely they would be the same thing...?

      1 in 4,210,857 of being struck (per second) would equate to a 31,536,000 in 132,793,586,352,000 chance of being struck per year.

      Regards,


      Gerard
[reply]
        Surely they would be the same thing...?

        Nope, not at all.

        Say you, Gerard, have a 10% chance of being flamed by me per second. This isn't the same as a 10% chance per year. Say I, the Anonymous Monk, decide to base the flame or not on a die roll. I Take a 10-sided die and roll it, if it comes up a 1, I flame, anything else, I don't (probably should be the other way around ;-)). Now, if I did this once a second and once a year, which scenario results in you having a greater chance of being flamed?

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