[lorinda]

you have 39 bad cards vs 8 good cards (thats what we are doing when we are dividing, we are making a ratio)
The word "to" in the odds 39 to 8, really is the english word (39 bad to 8 good)
when we divide by 8, we are just reducing this to get a term for "to 1" because that is the way we think better, your odds are 39 to 8, but this is hard to grasp when you are putting one chip in a pot, so we simplify to 4.9 to 1
Take the extreme case of two cards unknown, and you have one out. you have a ratio of 1:1 (one good, one bad) which is 1 to 1 odds.
With your method,you would get 2/1 which would severly undermine your thinking.