Slaying a Dragon

Dear bloggie,

I been called a "Kiam Siap Kui" (Stingy Ghost) by MFR more times than I can/bother to keep track of. But call me a "suah goo" (Village Cow), but this is really godlike...

As a monk wannabe, I have to kowtow to this guy for his apparent lack of attachment to money. Kowtow... RM35K down the drain and hardly any suicide threats or etc. Even can say "Money is a curse, spend it and earn it again"

Is tis wisdom or is tis foolish? Even this great hermit monk is stumped... I guess it's after all his hard earned money, so it's up to him on how he wanna spend/waste it... Some people choose to spend their hard-work toil on mundane things like house, family, car, clothes, hookers, etc... This guy merely chooses to spend it to get the thrill of living at the moment, I can't really say tat is a foolish thing now can I? Besides, how can one hope to gain something if one isn't prepare to lose something of equivalent value in return? Bigger Risk = Bigger Gain, Financial Management 101 (My FM lecturer will definitely kill me if he knew I linked FM principals to gambling)...

Yet again, as a pseudo-mathematician, I have to berated his rather questionable strategy in roulette. Call me silly, but I'm quite sure the odds of black or red is actually less than 0.5.

Here are the numbers:

Green: 1 (0)
Red: 18
Black: 18

So the odds or getting red or black is actually,

Red / Red + Black + Green
= 18 / (18 + 18 + 1)
= 18 / 37
= 0.4864

Black / Red + Black + Green
= 18 / (18 + 18 + 1)
= 18 / 37
= 0.4864

[Q.E.D]

The house still have a slight edge over you if you play a black/red game

The biggest problem I have here is with this theory of dragon. At first glance, it sounds pretty logical... Hey, 7 straight blacks, red have higher odds of appearing next... Let me tell u here right now this theory is TOTAL BULLSHIT!!

You see, you need to realize your not really betting against the house getting a 8 black dragon. Your bet is and always will remains a bet against the house getting a black (or green). See, each throw is really a mutually exclusive event. Throw 1 won't affect throw 2, etc. So at the 7th round, despite 7 earlier blacks, the odds of red in this round still remains a goddamn 0.4864!

If you say u were betting against the house on getting 8 blacks in a row from now then yes, I will tell you the odds are in your favor... I however won't deny my arguments is flawed in the sense that it is built upon the fact the roulette wheel is unbiased, but my main point was never to calculate the exact figure but rather to punch a hole in the dragon theory.

However I think my mathematical arguments will probably fall deaf on the ears of most gamblers, since after all, gamblers don't really believe in mathematics, they believe in luck...