🚀 go-pugleaf

John Miles wrote:

> DPH wrote:
> >
> > E. Faubion wrote:
> >
> > > Russian Roulette can be played safely.
> >
> > You have a very high threshold for safe.  The first time you pull the trigger, you have a
> > 1 in 6 chance of dying.  The second time you have 1 - (5/6) squared chance.  The next time
> > is 1 - (5/6) cubed.  etc.  That's if the cylinder is spun each time.  Those are way too
> > poor odds for me to consider something safe.
> >
>
> OK, I'll bite.  How in the world are you arriving at that figure?
>
> In Russian roulette, the odds of dying (or blowing a hole in your head,
> which is not necessarily the same thing) are exactly 1 in 6 each time
> you pull the trigger.  The number of times you've pulled the trigger on
> an empty cylinder has absolutely no influence on the odds in any
> subsequent trial.

If you do 1 in 6 multiple times, the odds of surviving the entire sequence go down in the
mathematical manner described.  That is, if the cylinder is spun in between each pull of the
trigger.  If it is not, the odds become even worse, with the 6th pull of the trigger at 0%
chance of not having the firearm discharge.

Another example.  Say you are having sex using a condom and the comdom has a failure rate of 1
in 100.000.  This is then a 99,999/100,000 that the condom _will_ be successful.  Your chances
of having an accident are then 1 - (99,999/100,000).  That's a mighty small number, and you and
your partner are pretty safe.  Now do it again.  You have 2 separate condoms with the same
failure rate, and the math for that (trust me) is 1 - ((99,999/100,000) times (99,999/100,000)),
or 1 - (99,999/100,000) squared.  Third time is 1 - ((99,999/100,000) ^ 3).  Keep doing it, and
the number that gets multiplied over and over by itself starts to approach zero, and the
solution to the mathematical expression begins to approach 1, where 1 is a mathematical
certainty that the even will happen.  If you have a _lot_ of sex, you start to want to back up
the comdom with something else, like birth control pills or a vasectomy!

Hope this helps.

DPH