Think the Airplane on a treadmill was tough?

You're just being silly now. Stop. The fact is that switching is always the better option because its 2/3rds as likely.

EDIT: How does my link have us believe that people will forget what their first choice was?
 
How is that being silly? As your above post obviously shows, many people, including those who are well educated in math, also saw it in that fashion, and that is to isolate the existence of a third cup prior to the first choice.

Again, I do not argue whether it actually is 2/3rd when you look at the whole picture
 
As your above post obviously shows, many people, including those who are well educated in math, also saw it in that fashion, and that is to isolate the existence of a third cup prior to the first choice.

How does this help your case? They were wrong.

Again, I do not argue whether it actually is 2/3rd when you look at the whole picture

Then you do not argue with the problem as its stated. You're arguing about a different scenario. One that apparently includes people with Alzheimer's.
 
It is not about whether they were right or wrong in picking that particular method, but if you look at the POV of the isolated event without a third cup, their reasoning is sound. It just happens to fall apart if you consider that there was a third cup.

And how does the scenario change? I don't remember the rule having some kind of limit to WHO actually participates. And as I've already said, even those who are very well educated still managed to fall to the same trap, so I don't see how this is limited to those who have Alzheimers, or mentally retarded in any fashion.

I don't suppose that you are calling all those Ph.D earned persons are retarded? In that case, I simply face palm.
 
Here, let me put it this way

I am not talking about whether the answer was right or wrong, but whether it was derived logically in the light of how they visioned the problem. For them, they saw the problem as two isolated cups. In that case, it was logical to assume 50/50.

Now, obviously, how they visioned the problem to be was wrong, but they followed through logically within the parameters of how they saw it in their mind, which, again, was without a third cup.
 
Oh my god man, are you ****ing serious? This is my last post on the matter, because I am thinking you're just trolling me now.

It is not about whether they were right or wrong in picking that particular method, but if you look at the POV of the isolated event without a third cup, their reasoning is sound. It just happens to fall apart if you consider that there was a third cup.

As you just stated, their reasoning is only sound when the problem is changed to include only two cups.

And how does the scenario change? I don't remember the rule having some kind of limit to WHO actually participates. And as I've already said, even those who are very well educated still managed to fall to the same trap, so I don't see how this is limited to those who have Alzheimers, or mentally retarded in any fashion.

First off, this question was posed in such a way that it implies reasonable operating conditions, such as a contestant who is not mentally impaired and can remember things that happened in the last five minutes.

Secondly, those smarty pants were F*CKING WRONG. Just because they didnt understand the situation doesn't mean the situation was any different. This trap you're talking about is irrelevant. They are still wrong in thinking its 50/50 if they can remember their previous choice. It only becomes relevant if you change the problem. And thus, they only become correct in their thinking when you CHANGE THE PROBLEM.

I don't suppose that you are calling all those Ph.D earned persons are retarded? In that case, I simply face palm.

No. But I am saying they were wrong.
 
You don't have to actually change the problem, to see it differently. Disregard whether seeing it differently yields in right or wrong answer. It still doesn't change the problem itself.


You are focusing too much on right and wrong. I am talking about whether they got to the 50/50 was logical, in light of how they saw the problem to be, which in this case is, yes.
 
It changes the problem if you remove the knowledge of the clue given to you by the host. Which is what your Alzheimers/green alien argument is doing. Your "BUT SMART PEOPLE" argument just falls flat on its face because they were wrong.

And seriously, this is my last post. **** you for trolling.
 
You keep saying wrong wrong wrong wrong.

I am not talking about whether they were right or wrong. Do you read my posts even?

I still don't see how it changes the problem. It is clear that those who believed the answer to be 50/50 failed to recognize the "clue give by the host", and thus, arrived at the 50/50 answer. Does this change the fact that the host gave the clue? NO. Did the person trying to solve the problem fail to consider it? YES.

PROBLEM STAYED THE SAME OMFG WORLD IS GOING TO EXPLODE
 
You keep saying wrong wrong wrong wrong.

I am not talking about whether they were right or wrong. Do you read my posts even?

I still don't see how it changes the problem. It is clear that those who believed the answer to be 50/50 failed to recognize the "clue give by the host", and thus, arrived at the 50/50 answer. Does this change the fact that the host gave the clue? NO. Did the person trying to solve the problem fail to consider it? YES.

PROBLEM STAYED THE SAME OMFG WORLD IS GOING TO EXPLODE

BUT THE 50/50 ANSWER IS WRONG GOD ****ING DAMN IT WHY DO I KEEP COMING BACK INTO THIS THREAD.

**** IT I'M PUTTING YOU ON IGNORE FOR THE REST OF THE WEEK GOD DAMN SON OF A BITCH I ****ING HATE YOU

Hopefully that gives you the reaction that you were trolling for, and we can leave it at that.
 
I'm pretty sure it isn't relevant.



Read my post, if you haven't already. The thing is you can't view the second child as an individual event after, because it already happened and you have to look at all the possible sex outcomes of having 2 children and weigh each option equally. Since there are 4 total possible outcomes and the girl/girl is obviously ruled out, that leaves 3 options and only 1 of those 3 is two boys.

Nope I think you're wrong and here's why.

You say the possible outcomes are

GG
BG
GB
BB

However, I feel that is incorrect as if you can switch around the BG to have GB too, then it should read something like this

GG
GG
BG
GB
BB
BB

Becuase after all they are different boys and girls so order somewhat does matter. Now if you repeat the probablility calculation, it's 50/50.

Alternatively do it with

GG
BG
BB

What you can't do is have, BG, GB, but only have one of both BB and GG
 
Btw, guys, giving birth to a boy or girl isn't 50/50. It's more like 48/52
 
Btw, guys, giving birth to a boy or girl isn't 50/50. It's more like 48/52

Yeah there are slightly more women than men in the world simply because it's evolutionarily beneficial. Also women live longer than men so that skews it more. Enough to offset the whole Chinese deal where no one wants a girl for their one child. I wonder if India will institute something like that. It's weird seeing all those little kids running around in their begging schemes.

Anyways I don't get this one. I don't even wanna think about it.
 
Nope I think you're wrong and here's why.

You say the possible outcomes are

GG
BG
GB
BB

However, I feel that is incorrect as if you can switch around the BG to have GB too, then it should read something like this

GG
GG
BG
GB
BB
BB

Becuase after all they are different boys and girls so order somewhat does matter. Now if you repeat the probablility calculation, it's 50/50.

No, that doesn't make sense. That would be like adding some kind of arbitrary factor, like 'what about the possibility of them being born with 11 fingers' and adding that to the list of outcomes. It doesn't change anything, because you'd have to apply it to each case because the chances of it happening are equal for each case. So you'd just double your list of outcomes, not changing the odds of what actually matters.

If you use the argument "after all they are different boys and girls" to add 2 more choices like that, then you'd have to add those choices to GB and BG as well, for a different set of GB and BG. Thus evening out the odds again.
 
However, I feel that is incorrect as if you can switch around the BG to have GB too, then it should read something like this

GG
GG
BG
GB
BB
BB

Becuase after all they are different boys and girls so order somewhat does matter. Now if you repeat the probablility calculation, it's 50/50.

Alternatively do it with

GG
BG
BB

What you can't do is have, BG, GB, but only have one of both BB and GG

This is interesting. I can't find anything online that addresses this.

EDIT: No, Vegeta is right.


Lets say the parents decide beforehand to name their children. One daugher would be Jill, the other Kate, and one son James and the other Brian.

So possible outcomes would be:
Jill : Kate *
Kate : Jill *
Jill : James
Jill : Brian
Kate : James
Kate : Brian
James : Brian
Brian : James

And out of those, the ones with asterisks are eliminated. So now the chances are 2/6 that both children will be boys. Still 1/3.
 
No I still don't agree with either of you.

The only possible outcomes, regardless of order are:

GG
BG
BB

Knowing ones a boy makes it 50/50. When he says ones a boy, he doesn't bring order of birth into it, so there is no need too. It's 50/50. And I didn't understand a word of Vegetas post, no offense, just couldn't make sense of it.
 
When he says ones a boy, he doesn't bring order of birth into it, so there is no need too.

You do need to though, because of the fact that there are 2 separate births, like 2 tosses of a coin. Even if the result for both is still "1 boy" it's a more likely outcome because there are 2 ways of attaining it.
 
You do need to though, because of the fact that there are 2 separate births, like 2 tosses of a coin. Even if the result for both is still "1 boy" it's a more likely outcome because there are 2 ways of attaining it.

Okay, but then I see why you should have

GG
GG
BG
GB
BB
BB

Or labelling them

G1 G2

G2 G1

B1 G2

G2 B1

B1 B2

B2 B1

Now, your error, once again, is in thinking that I should also be including

B2 G1
and
B1 G2

However this is wrong, in the BG GB scenarios, there is only one boy and one girl, making the B1 and B2 labelling redundant.

It is 50/50 people!
 
However this is wrong, in the BG GB scenarios, there is only one boy and one girl, making the B1 and B2 labelling redundant.

The only reason it's 'redundant' is because you're adding the redundant choices of differentiating between the 2 girls or 2 boys if the births are same sex. If you're going to add something like that, then you have to add it for the different sex births too.
 
Jesus.


Let me try to give you another scenario that shows why your logic fails.

The chances of flipping 2 heads in a row are 1/4. Right? We can agree on that, it's a fact.

So, let's write out what all the possible outcomes are that demonstrate why it's 1/4

HT
TH
HH
TT

2 heads is 1/4. Notice how it's important that TH and HT are two unique choices? If they weren't, your odds would work out to be 1/3, which is just wrong.

If we did what you're saying and added a reverse HH and reverse TT, then the odds would work out to be 2/6, which is also wrong (because it simplifies to 1/3).
 
Okay then, I flip two coins, one lands on a heads what is the chance the other lands on heads.

Possibilities are:

HH
HT
TH
TT

And holy **** it seems I'm wrong. Kudos, Vegeta
 
"And then everyone became friends again and lived happily ever after. The end."
"That seems like kind of a retarded ending daddy."
"Well it was kind of a retarded argument son.
 
Yeah.... I'm gonna give you guys something else to argue about: 0.999999999999999999999999999999999999.... = 1
 
I still refuse to believe that. I get the math. But the math has to be wrong. It doesn't make any god damn sense.
 
I still refuse to believe that. I get the math. But the math has to be wrong. It doesn't make any god damn sense.

Well, do you get that 0.000000000000000....000001 = 0?
 
Took me a while, but I realized I screwed up by thinking that the boy had to be the first child (dont even ask how that makes any sense).

All in all, agreed with 1/3.
 
Also, the answer to the OP's question isn't 1/3.

Thats only if you ignore the Tuesday part which we were doing for the sake of showing Solaris why you had to have BG and a GB.

If you include the Tuesday part, then the answer is 12/27. Apparently Solaris didn't read his own links :p
 
Ah, I thought we were counting the Tuesday fact as irrelevant :p
 
For most of the thread we were, but only to prove a point.
 
But that doesn't exist. You can't write 0.000...01

I thought you could write it as:
0 . 0(with dot on top) 1

I'm probably wrong, though.

The thing is, anyway, that 1 - 0.99999999999999..... = 0.000000000...0001
 
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