Trivia: Coin Toss is Not Random

Posted by Alex in Daily Trivia on September 26, 2007 at 1:26 am


If you flip a coin, you’ll have equal chance (50-50) of getting head or tail, right?

Wrong. Stanford math professors proved that a flipped coin will land as it started 51% of the time.

source: Persi Diaconis, et al. Dynamical Bias in the Coin Toss [PDF] (2004)
By the way, Persi is a very colorful character who once proved that 7 shuffles is all you need to get a random deck of cards.




Previous post
this post? Please email this            
Next post
FROM THE NEATORAMA ONLINE STORE » more



COMMENT

3 comments to "Trivia: Coin Toss is Not Random"

  1. kid icarus
    September 26th, 2007 at 1:01 pm

    unless, of course, rosencrantz and guildenstern are tossing it

  2. Donnie
    September 26th, 2007 at 2:21 pm

    Did they factor in the coin landing on its edge?

  3. just a guy
    September 27th, 2007 at 1:19 am

    Professors love proving things that are counter-intuitive. Its like catnip to them.


PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT

Neatorama Comment Policy
You don't have to register or login to comment, but it's easier if you do so. Comments aren't censored, but those that are abusive or off-topic may be edited or deleted.


Stay updated on the comments with Comment RSS