This isn't a come-on. I'm in a very serious relationship with a landscape architect.

Oliver ,'Conviction (1)'


Natter 40: The Nice One  

Off-topic discussion. Wanna talk about corsets, duct tape, or physics? This is the place. Detailed discussion of any current-season TV must be whitefonted.


DXMachina - Nov 17, 2005 6:55:33 pm PST #5092 of 10006
You always do this. We get tipsy, and you take advantage of my love of the scientific method.

Therefore, I think they're most likely expecting you to treat it as if each ticket is an independent trial, i.e. the "How many rolls of the dice" deal.

Doesn't that still come out to twenty?


Trudy Booth - Nov 17, 2005 6:56:34 pm PST #5093 of 10006
Greece's financial crisis threatens to take down all of Western civilization - a civilization they themselves founded. A rather tragic irony - which is something they also invented. - Jon Stewart

t props chin in hands and watches the pwetty bwains


Emily - Nov 17, 2005 7:01:35 pm PST #5094 of 10006
"In the equation E = mc⬧, c⬧ is a pretty big honking number." - Scola

Right, but it isn't independent trials. Can we really regard it that way?


Emily - Nov 17, 2005 7:02:12 pm PST #5095 of 10006
"In the equation E = mc⬧, c⬧ is a pretty big honking number." - Scola

Doesn't that still come out to twenty?

Oddly, no. I understand that bit. Er, I think.


P.M. Marc - Nov 17, 2005 7:04:46 pm PST #5096 of 10006
So come, my friends, be not afraid/We are so lightly here/It is in love that we are made; In love we disappear

So, watched the last few minutes of Alias tonight.

Where, as Paul and I both noticed, they invaded Fisher Plaza! (Where Paul worked until last year.) Paul was all, "Hey! That's my old rooftop! Hey! I've been in that stairwell!"

Those were the sat dishes he controlled!


billytea - Nov 17, 2005 7:14:12 pm PST #5097 of 10006
You were a wrong baby who grew up wrong. The wrong kind of wrong. It's better you hear it from a friend.

Doesn't that still come out to twenty?

No, then it comes out to the value of n such that 0.975^n = 0.5. There are logs involved. It's a thing.

Right, but it isn't independent trials. Can we really regard it that way?

If there are, say, 40,000,000 tickets, then it's effectively independent. If it's 4,000 it's probably close enough. It'd have to be a very small lottery for it to be materially different from independent.


Emily - Nov 17, 2005 7:19:18 pm PST #5098 of 10006
"In the equation E = mc⬧, c⬧ is a pretty big honking number." - Scola

So, each different lottery ticket is like an entry in a totally different lottery?


Jesse - Nov 17, 2005 7:19:24 pm PST #5099 of 10006
Sometimes I trip on how happy we could be.

Em turns a year in a week and a half.

Holy crap.

Hey Rio! How's the bod? (Was it your hip, with the moving machine and the whatnot?) Did you answer that already and I skimmed by?


aurelia - Nov 17, 2005 7:21:19 pm PST #5100 of 10006
All sorrows can be borne if you put them into a story. Tell me a story.

Since TV Guide changed their format I haven't seen them in checkout lines. Have other people noticed this, or is it just where I shop?


billytea - Nov 17, 2005 7:24:00 pm PST #5101 of 10006
You were a wrong baby who grew up wrong. The wrong kind of wrong. It's better you hear it from a friend.

So, each different lottery ticket is like an entry in a totally different lottery?

Well, enough like it to treat it that way. If you have 40,000,000 tickets and 1,000,000 winners, then whether or not ticket A is a winner does almost nothing to the probability that ticket B is a winner.