"The Zone"

[Al Schoonmaker]

I agree. Let me quote from my, "Playing the rush, Part IIL Defense.

As I said in the last column, ‘when they feel they’re on a rush, many people become too confident, loose and aggressive. In fact, that’s what most people regard as ‘playing the rush.’” It’s one of poker’s greatest kicks, and it often works well because the other players react so foolishly.
THE OTHER PLAYERS’ REACTIONS
When someone is on a rush, the entire table can go on tilt. Both the rusher and his opponents share a delusion — the laws of probability have been suspended — and they may all misplay their hands. The rusher pushes too hard, and the others let him run over them. Sometimes a few people decide to “play sheriff” and overplay their own hands on the foolish idea that “his luck has to change.”
DON’T SHARE THEIR DELUSION.
Your first and most important task is to remember that past hands have absolutely no predictive value. The odds of any player’s having the best cards next hand are always exactly 1/n, with “n” being the number of players at the table. It does not matter whether someone has won the last ten pots or hasn’t won one all night; the odds against having the best cards next hand never change.

You can read the entire article at cardplayer.com. Click on magazine, writers, and my name.

Regards,

Al

[Al Schoonmaker]

Many solid studies have proved that ESP is BS.

Every single time that a well controlled study has been conducted, ESP does not occur. Rhine, who conducted the famous research at Duke University, was a fraud. He actually threw out cases that had negative results. He strenuously resisted every attempt to add proper controls. Each time they were added, the effects diminished. When enough controls were in place, the effects disappeared.

You can read about him in "Voodoo Science."

Competent researchers have a cynical saying, "ESP means Error Some Place."

The idea that psychology cannot be measured is also nonsense. We can't measure as accurately as physicists, but we are a long way from an art.

Regards,

Al

[chezlaw]

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But they are all BS.

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Are they really BS, Al? Are you saying this because of solid scientific research? I'm of the crowd that thinks that Psychology isn't really a science. Maybe art, but not true science. Mainly because it can't be measured accurately.

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Psychology may provide theories that are tough or even impossible to scientifically verify but that does not put them on any level with ESP.

ESP, if it existed, would be trivial to verify. Experiments with coins and cards proving that ESP worked would be standard science and the gambling industry as we know it would not exist, look at the way they handle card-counters and imagine what would happen if ESP practitioners were at work.

chez