RANDOM thoughts

[DMACM]

fine be that way. [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

[SuitedSixes]

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They believe in their God at the exculusion of all other gods and believe that disagreeing with them may have dire consequences. They believe that everything happens for a reason. They believe in fate. They believe in destiny. Believing these things brings comfort to the majority of people on this planet... as ironic as it seems.

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I am comforted by these things and I wonder, if as a doctor you have ever experienced anything that cannot be explained by simple randomness.

[Irieguy]

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I am comforted by these things and I wonder, if as a doctor you have ever experienced anything that cannot be explained by simple randomness.

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Randomness is far from simple.

Irieguy

[Benholio]

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I am comforted by these things and I wonder, if as a doctor you have ever experienced anything that cannot be explained by simple randomness.

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Randomness is far from simple.

Irieguy

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What isn't simple about it? Or do I just need some puffs on the peace pipe to go with my alcohol tonight...

[microbet]

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Somebody (read: practically everybody) will misinterpret this post as an assertion by me that so and so isn't as good as he thinks he is.

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You wrote this whole essay just to say how much I suck. Nice.

[valejo]

I certainly agree with the OP that the 2+2 approach would benefit from more science and less pride and/or emotion.

Part of applying a scientific approach to poker is to understand variance and it's roll. But variance doesn't have to be a parlor word around here. We can study the extent to which randomness can explain events. Statistics gives us a boatload of tools to help identify patterns in seemingly random data.

Yes, up and down swings can happen by random chance. However, if my data shows that I have 40% ROI over 100 tournaments, that is enough to be about 99% confident that I am a winning poker player if I continue to utilize the same strategies. Similarly, if I have 15% ROI over 10,000 tournaments but I've run at -20% ROI for the past 100, the probability is high that I've been playing poorly and I need to revisit my strategy.

2+2 should spend more time understanding and modeling the random walks of poker careers.

One easy model is to use one-sided hypothesis testing to predict the lowest possible ROI a given player can expect long run based on their current sample.* A second useful tool is confidence intervals for players with a huge database of tournaments to help them detect when they might be playing badly.

* Of course, we can only measure this to a specified degree of confidence; we can never be 100% sure we aren't just lucky.

[SuitedSixes]

Nice post.

[Gramps]

Newton said for every action there is a reaction. He broke things down into a measurable, predictable, mechanical science. Individualism and Western Society developed out of these sorts of ideas (or something). We're comfortable with these concepts.

Screw Quantum Physics. Heisenberg is full of sh-t, God does not play dice (One of greatest f-ing quotes of all-time BTW). If I average 6 BB/100 for 2,000 hands of limit poker or a 40% ITM for 100 higher level SNGs, I am a genius brilliant player.

If I go on a horrid losing streak, internet poker is rigged, and when I go another another heater it is because the "Party rigging switch" has been flipped back to off, and everything is right in the universe...

[Bigwig]

Weird.

If you're not trying to say that some results are based on luck, then what are you trying to say?

I understand your point in general, but it's relation to SNG poker is slim at best, complete gibberish at it's worst.

Whatever.

[microbet]

Seriously, interesting post. I'll check out the book, although he's probably preaching to the choir with me.