How Not to Be Wrong: The Power of Mathematical Thinking - with Jordan Ellenberg

The maths we learn in school can seem like a dull set of rules, laid down by the ancients and not to be questioned. Jordan Ellenberg shows how wrong this view is through stories that show the power of mathematical thinking.
Buy Jordan's book "How Not to Be Wrong: The Hidden Maths of Everyday Life" - geni.us/aBdKqAq
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Maths touches everything we do, allowing us to see the hidden structures beneath the messy and chaotic surface of our daily lives. Maths is the science of not being wrong, worked out through centuries of hard work and argument.
Jordan Ellenberg is a professor of Mathematics at University of Wisconsin, and the 'Do the Math' columnist at Slate. His book 'How not to be wrong: The hidden mathematics of everyday life' was be published in June 2015.
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[@afihaileywibowo1095]

I'm reading his book as we speak - amazing book, I feel my confidence drops realizing people are so smart, but I enjoy it nevertheless. And as simple as it is, it took me a while to grasp about the armor bullet plane analogy. I realized it's in the language, or my lack of English understanding thereof. Prof. Ellenberg said quoting Wald: "You have to put the armor where the bullet is not". I spin my head around it. I understand, but not that fully understand like Aha! So after a while I rephrase: You have to put the armor at it's (the plane) weakest, and it could be: easy to target / the biggest / the most exposed / the most vulnerable area. Bingo! Make sense to me! Where do the police put the bulletproof vest; on the body! Why not head, easily - well not that easy - targeted and exposed too, because head is smaller and you need precision. Anyway, I continue reading. This is for my note only😅

[@ben.p]

The planes that came back with bullet holes survived well enough to make it back. Therefore we should reinforce the planes with bullet holes that didn’t make it back. If you want more planes to make it back.

[@ben.p]

Survivorship bias if you wanna read more

[@ben.p]

If you want to apply this thinking outside of planes, you could think of entrepreneurs; reinforcing where the bullets are not with respect to entrepreneurs means learning from those whose businesses failed and correcting their mistakes rather than those whose businesses succeeded and trying to replicate their success

[@tuga2112]

Am i the only one that finds Jordan's enthusiasm while explaining this pretty contagious ?

[@TheRoyalInstitution]

Nope, we agree.

[@rainmaker704]

His enthusiasm is kinda comedic. I feel like he may be good at telling jokes. His enthusiasm makes you want to participate. I randomly found this vid but i watched the whole thing just because his enthusiasm got me excited.

[@appleslover]

Yeah, it's catchier than the cororavirus

[@ancientswordrage]

SAME!

[@nashkairo4863]

A tip: watch series on flixzone. Been using it for watching loads of movies during the lockdown.

[@BlueSoulTiger]

The essence of Projective geometry in 2 minutes (38:39). Excellent

[@mathgasm8484]

One of my professors got me to read this book and talked about it for the semester each week.

[@demerex6510]

He made his explanation of why/how he chose his numbers much more complicated than it really had to be. His picks were simply the set of all 3 digit combinations that include a unique pair of 2 numbers. You will see that no combination will include the same 2 numbers (i.e you wouldn't use 1,2,3 and 2,3,4). There are 7 possible combinations which is why he said to select 7 tickets. Since you only need 2 number correct in order to win, you always win. So I would imagine that the MIT students did the same thing but scaled up and that the number of possible combinations using this method matched the number of tickets the MIT group was purchasing.

[@agcwall]

Thank you. Yes. As a computer scientist his explanation infuriates me. As you generate tickets, all you need to do is track how many times you've used each number, and pick the ones that you've used the least so far. The non-Euclidean space with line intersections is interesting, but totally misses the point.

[@deeXaeed]

I was thinking exactly the same. But I am still a beginner so I don't know.

[@abrahamlincoln9055]

Well. I think the " projective geometry" behind the number picking was just a gimmick to make the lecture more interesting. Maybe to make him look more intelligent. Or a marketing strategy to sell more books. You know how it goes. When people see something which seems smart and they can kind of understand they buy it. I could not find any substance in his lecture other than cheap curiosities.

[@marko8584]

And like he said,Mit guys played lottery that had better value than cost/ticket. So in his example-lottery the main prize should have been 7$ and deuce 3$. And thats how you win.

[@peterkay7458]

demerex thank you that is very well explained much appreciated. I tutor physics and math but statistics was nver my thing...drove me nuts actually

[@JumboJimbo100]

I not a math genius but I enjoy it. Listening to this man I get the feeling he wants to dazzel with his brilliance rather than explain what he is doing.

[@juanamador2965]

I read the story about James Harvey from MIT and his Random Hall strategy and Mohan Srivastava who cracked the tic tac toe scratch off lottery are My favorites.

[@JoyceFoss-m5z]

I love how you always make things simple and straightforward!

[@doodelay]

I'm reading it's book and he's got great wit and humor. This all becomes apparent within the first few pages. Further, he's taught me so much about mathematics.

[@ThunderAppeal]

Which indicates that you knew absolutely nothing about math. If I were you I wouldnt admit to what you admitted to.

[@ReasonableForseeability]

@@ThunderAppeal He also wrote "I'm reading it's book" and there are two errors in the word IT'S: one semantic (should be HIS or HER) and one grammatical: (ITS, if Jordan is neuter).

[@arnbrandy]

I just watched it because it went into autoplay, because de title sounded a bit clickbaity... And this lecture proved to be better than I could even imagine.

[@thsscapi]

What's with all the comments about his "umms" in his talk? He's an established mathematician and a professor contributing to education. He doesn't have to give this talk, he didn't have to share his research and findings about this - he already wrote a whole book. All these "umms" means that he isn't great at giving talks, but he did. Perhaps, the next time you see him, he'll be giving great talks, and he'll still be a great mathematician. We all have to start somewhere. Give the guy a break.

[@inveritategloria]

Very naive observation at best. One CAN judge a good mathematician from the way he speaks.

[@olivtrees8749]

Really great talk he's giving. But he really does need a voice coach. It's not the umms that are a problem really, it's the lack of support in his voice which is caused by shallow breath. It makes him gasp a little for air while he's speaking, makes his voice thinner and makes it more difficult for the audience to listen. If he doesn't address the problem- seeing as how he uses his projective voice daily as a teacher- he can eaily get vocal and throat problems many years down the road.

[@conradlewis516]

In Veritate Gloria - I agree that listening to someone speak about a subject says a lot about their mastery of the material. However, most people cannot retain their train of thought as well in front of an audience. For instance, I know Chemistry very well and can talk with anyone one-on-one for hours about it, but get me in front of 30 - 100 people and I get too self conscious and stop thinking as clearly as I need to to carry the talk forward. So, similar to the last statements made by thsscapi, one must work to get better at thinking clearly in front of an audience.

[@Munku81]

All these "umms" is actually a sign of quality. He doesn't need to prepare a speech and memorize is it to tell the audience about his points, he knows his topic by heart and can instantaneously compose a talk right in front of where he stands. It's like a musicican giving you a live concert instead of playing a tape.It's like a chef preparing your food right in front of you instead of getting it out the fridge.

[@AnitaCock]

i totally concur! kzbin.info/www/bejne/rpPac4h-nK2Jl5I (Michelle Obama insists that you GET UP & MOVE YOUR A$$!)

[@Blackmark52]

Regarding the first story, I've heard that before, but it was a different story. It was about helmets in WWI. The generals wanted to know why wearing helmets caused so many more wounded soldiers and how to fix the problem. The analyst pointed out that dead soldiers without helmets weren't counted among the wounded.

[@dmytro_shum]

Yeah. It is called "Survivorship bias". en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias

[@TooManyBrackets]

Heard this same story about Lord Blacketts operational research group in the UK....

[@tzslungnip3843]

I think if the Brits took the target off the fuselage, more pilots would come back.

[@irrelevant_noob]

Tzs Lung Nip but what if that was kind of a reverse-psychology trick, that made the enemy shoot at the target instead of other more fragile bits of the airplane? ;-)

[@tzslungnip3843]

@@irrelevant_noob I think that's what they tell the new widows.

[@thomaskirsch2209]

The talk is good. The book is great. I am on the 2nd read and find it to be one of the better maths books I have read. Any engineer or engineering student should get much from this book simply from the exposure to applied statistical mathematics. Thank you for a wonderful book.

[@ravegraveyard]

Thomas Kirsch is the book something like freakonomics?

[@hughjazz4936]

"Hmm, these stories sound familiar, don't I have a book with these?" Turns out I got this guy's book.

[@goldbeer9185]

Can you tell me what is thid video s said?

[@adamkaidunnaustralia5158]

😂😂😂

[@elisabetsinaga8746]

@@adamkaidunnaustralia5158 ccc, zbn . N .. .

[@n-steam]

@ 8:06 the expected value of the lottery ticket is not 79.8 cents, it's 59.1 cents. The error is in assuming that a 'free ticket' has the value of the ticket price, when the value is actually the expected value of the ticket. This produces an equation like: n = 1/9.3 + 4/39 + 15/80 + 5/47 + n/6.8 n-n/6.8 = 1/9.3 + 4/39 + 15/80 + 5/47 5.8n = 6.8x(1/9.3 + 4/39 + 15/80 + 5/47) n = (6.8/5.8)x(1/9.3 + 4/39 + 15/80 + 5/47) which works out to be $0.5908...

[@Jeff121456]

Another interesting point is that the state does not get that $0.80 on the free tickets nor does it increase the rollover.

[@ReasonableForseeability]

I disagree. But I guess it's debatable. Here I'd say the value is the price. Even if it's the expected value, we have a recursive definition because the E.V. depends on the value. I guess you could call it x and get a simple equation in x (which appears on both sides).

[@happy_labs]

I'm really surprised to see negativity in the comments, because I spent this whole talk thinking wow this guy has a really engaging presentation style.

[@Friek555]

I got very annoyed by him yelling at me for no reason. He has a microphone, he doesn't need to yell like he does. It just makes his voice very annoying to me.

[@MartinJohnZ]

I like his presentation style. He sounds like he's going to burst out in laughter any time.

[@gkess7106]

The umm, Right?, OK? are his stalling tricks so his fast speaking doesn’t slow when he has to arrange his next sentence in his mind. Training could help him with all this. Math easily flows through his mind. Slowing it to verbalize is painful to ‘watch’.

[@mooster47]

I am not surprised at the undeserved negativity. It's obvious some people get a thrill out of finding fault. It's everywhere on the internet in response to virtually everything. Some people are only here for these opportunities, and the more expert the speaker or writer, the more rewarding this is for anonymous people who probably lack more positive ways to stroke their own egos. In no way is this meant to object to constructive criticism that is clearly intended to be helpful. For an example of that, see the remark by Oliv Trees above. In any case, I found Dr. Ellenberg's manner of speaking quite engaging and the subject matter much more entertaining than I expected, as a person who is generally rather maths aversive and frequently annoyed by the speech patterns of certain speakers. I'll bet the courses he teaches fill up fast. When mentally stable people encounter something they don't like on this massive smorgasbord they immediately leave in search of something else. They don't hang around to poke jabs.

[@rudyNok]

He is annoyingly screeching and shrieking a lot. If he would speak a little calmer the talk would be much more enjoyable.

[@Dr10Jeeps]

It would appear that the 200 or so thumbs down people are all great speakers but......not too intelligent. If you want to learn things in life sometimes you have to forget the medium and focus on the information being transmitted. Great talk. Thank you.

[@shawnpheneghan]

Sorry, he was tough to listen too and made a huge error at the start of his "big" example. Tough to have faith in the presentation.

[@canadiannuclearman]

This reminds me of the Chinese fortune cookie problem. In Canada they have a lotto called 6-49. Or in combinatronics 49 choose 6. Or 13.9 million combinations In many Chinese restaurants they give out fortune cookies with your bill. People would use these numbers for picking lotto numbers. Of course there was no better chance to win then using any other 6 numbers then the 6 that was on the fortune cookie. What people did not realize was the printer of the fortune cookies was lazy and they did not have a random number generator for the six numbers. So the printer printed a few thousand fortune cookies using the same 6 numbers. So purely by chance of course after many years the lotto number matching the fortune cookie came up. The lotto commission discovered many people won using the same 6 numbers and people were disappointed to share the jackpot with many others. At first the commission suspected fraud but soon found out that people were using the numbers on the fortune cookie. The commission talked to the printer and asked them to use more random numbers when printing fortune cookies. So the advise in Canada is to NOT use numbers from fortune cookies because it decreases your chance of sharing the jackpot.

[@karljordan7114]

Same problem with RC radios. Some manufacturers seem to make radios of the same frequency in batches. Sent to stores in batches. Bought by guys in the neighborhood from the same store. . . Then the field has four other guys on your frequency and there are a dozen frequencies not being used:(

[@irrelevant_noob]

Gary Lewis interesting story. Only one problem with it: the conclusion. It should rather be that using the fortune cookie numbers would INCREASE the chance of sharing a jackpot, i think you meant that it decreases the chance of getting an unshared jackpot. ;-)

[@gangfire5932]

So the optimal strategy is to collect a bunch of fortune cookies and DON'T use their numbers when playing the lottery.

[@EricPena86]

Gary Lewis Good thing this guy didn't listen to you www.wcvb.com/article/fortune-cookie-means-big-fortune-for-powerball-winner-1/27736099

[@hugo3222]

@@gangfire5932 Yes, and DON'T use ANY numbers you did not invent yourself. Germany 1977: Over 200 players shared the jackpot, almost all living in the north west. Also Germany 1977: The same six numbers were drawn, which were drawn in the Netherlands the week before.

[@samuelstanley2454]

What a unique way to teach math without numbers. That's like teaching the alphabet with numbers instead of letters

[@kathyyoung1774]

My observation has been that when using “quick picks,” the lottery appears to be set up to “share” by giving several people the same combination, thus spreading out a large winning and creating more winners with smaller amounts. Many large totals are split among several people who admit they used “quick picks.”

[@erictaylor5462]

27:00 Haven't seen ahead yet, but I think I know why they filled it out by hand. For the strategy to work, they needed all different numbers. Having the "quick picks" would have given them tickets with the exact same number. Lets see if I'm right.

[@TheDionysianFields]

That was my thought too but that's not it at all.

[@leeorshimhoni8949]

You don't know that you don't know. What you do know, is never complete and absolute. Therefore, one should always assume he is ignorant.

[@dondake3409]

wow sal's punishment is going really well!

[@bee6418]

Benny Z literally all I was thinking 😂😂

[@Ensource]

hahahahahaha

[@ballsense4142]

I literally clicked on it thinking it was a punishment lol

[@poeticflames]

🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

[@zenpvnk]

Great book... very entertaining read. Got it from the library, but when I finished I had to go buy a copy just to have, cus I love having cool books (especially cool math books). This is a cool one.

[@adamkaidunnaustralia5158]

lol It is so cool it's Tricy-cooled...like Billie Eilish riding around on tiny tricycle. Three times for emphasis? Why no love for Empha-bro though? 😂😂😂

[@guptahaha]

@@adamkaidunnaustralia5158 ugh come on

[@adamkaidunnaustralia5158]

@@guptahaha ...no, you come on, what can't feel enough to lol, so you troll on year old posts thinking they won't reply maybe? I'm sad for you bro and happy for me knowing that i can find whimsy in the small things while you get your rocks off trashing others thinking that somehow makes you a bigger person 😢😂 hope you get a life but have a great day anyway if you dont, deuschebag 😂😎👍

[@KUniverseY]

Do you have pdf?

[@DanicaChloe]

I believe the reason they controlled the numbers selected was to make finding the winning tickets easier.

[@MrJackpots]

We need more upvotes on this answer, because it's actually the right one and this guys speech is horribly ironic given the title. Lotteries are completely random which means it doesn't matter which numbers are chosen since they all have the same probability of being the winning numbers.

[@jamesrogers2963]

Great math lecture! Still trying to sort our the logic of why the geometry idea works on a random drawing...

[@packrat2113]

It isn't about the geometry, it's about the possibilities.

[@erictaylor5462]

When buying a lot of tickets, if selecting numbers randomly, how do you prevent duplication? Two tickets with the same numbers would, in effect, be paying for the same ticket twice. This isn't a problem when getting 5 tickets, but the chance of duplication goes up with more and more tickets.

[@jonathanzilk6089]

+Eric Taylor but why isn't it both?

[@erictaylor5462]

Jonathan Zilk Both what?

[@jonathanzilk6089]

oh never mind. I misread your comment.

[@DanielSmedegaardBuus]

Two identical tickets will still give each their prize. There are always duplicates in lotteries, which is why you see multiple winners sharing a jackpot.

[@erictaylor5462]

Daniel Smedegaard Buus No not always. Also if one person buys both duplicate tickets then they are in effect the SAME ticket. Both tickets "win" but the prize is split between them. If one person gets both halves they have gotten one whole prize.

[@DelireWeb]

At around 3:50, I understood that he was actually talking about "rational intuition" : intellectual constructs leading to science and philosophy (real philosophy, not Oprah's "feel good" psychology for lemmings). Mathematics is a "hardcore" consequence of such constructs, a tool that we've invented to aid us for such endeavor in "materialistic" science.

[@Hippiekinkster]

If I am reading between the lines of your post correctly, I think you would enjoy this video: kzbin.info/www/bejne/h322iqKVjqmJjM0

[@husainshaikh8724]

The short story he told is called survivor bias. Veritasium covered this in a very fun way.

[@Ensource]

thanks, checking that out!

[@tinmvn]

I think like this by nature all the time. People love to attempt arguing with me and always lose quickly. Especially my family they hate me.

[@chickenshieee]

His book was insanely good

[@chrisofnottingham]

Really interesting talk although I felt that in terms of narrative it kind of fizzled out toward the end.

[@KarenSDR]

The end was the exciting part, where he brought in the connection with projective geometry.

[@lancebaker1374]

Yes, narrative is important.... what is narrative?

[@myginfo]

in the lottery example picking by hand will also give you more chances just by removing duplicates. Because two winning ticket 167 and 167 that match the numbers still only win 6 dollars so if all 7 numbers are the same and match the jackpot you are wasting the other 6 tickets. Probably not significant in real example because it assumes you win the whole jackpot on at least two tickets, so probably not worth filling in 200,000 scant ron forms.

[@Varksterable]

Not sure exactly what the maths behind the roll-down is, but picking by hand also gives the chance of choosing numbers that other people are less likely to pick, possibly giving a bigger share of the full pot. E.g. don't pick straight sequences. Don't pick only numbers under 31. (People have a bias towards picking birthdays) etc.

[@venkateshbabu1504]

Mathematics is huge. Integral. Line integral. Straight lines are integrated. Then surface integral. That's called plane integrals. Wave integral which are integral of wave type curves. Circle integral somewhat like circle inside a circle etc.

[@gwennoack]

This talk is GREAT! His passion is infective.

[@tylercooper1551]

You meant infectious, right?

[@niallfm4409]

For the second question had it been considered that if a quick pick machine picks numbers at random, so the students may have just been trying to avoid receiving multiples of the same number?

[@rbrijeshy]

I am currently reading the book, its really awesome! This video really helped land the lottery story.

[@anch95]

I'm surprised the lottery organizers are so careless to not even calculate payouts, basically the first job you should have done. Also, in these state lotteries, does a person matching 4 also win the prize for matching 3, 2 and 1? If not, the tables are incorrect.

[@robertschlesinger1342]

Excellent overview of how some MIT students beat the Massachusetts Lottery, taking away $millions in profits..

[@ananyasrivastava5128]

Fasinating. Thank you for uploading.

[@aminkanji8501]

I love you

[@BelalAlDroubi]

amazing topic and and super interesting book.. i will buy it and read it ASAP

[@sejalb725]

Please don’t hate on him. It’s a misunderstanding. The title doesn’t explain that the title is the name of his book, so it basically half clickbait. That’s why he is talking about his book. The book is actually great!

[@bastiat6865]

I'd prefer the book over his lecture, until he gets some coaching on presentation.

[@ReasonableForseeability]

I've never heard the expression "hate on", versus plain "hate". Where are you from?

[@ddiehl5664]

Fascinating! Great lecture - thank you for uploading.

[@MrMZaccone]

Why didn't the state do anything about it? Because state employees are seldom M.I.T. graduates.

[@ameremortal]

Edmond Dantez I smell corruption too. Shame!

[@MrMZaccone]

@@ameremortal Heinlein's razor - Never attribute to malice what can be accounted for by simple stupidity.

[@ameremortal]

Edmond Dantez I doubt the people who profit from running the lottery are stupid. People looking for a hack will not stop at anything. But for something like this to happen, you need corruption...

[@Ozgipsy]

Best math anecdote ever.

[@acetate909]

Nerds broke the lottery. I love that story so much.

[@TheDionysianFields]

Except they didn't. They made the state a lot of money.

[@David-tp7sr]

Interesting talk, but the title is misleading.

[@itellyouforfree7238]

No, it isn't. This combinatorial design is precisely to devise a strategy to avoid losing (meaning that all your guesses of the lottery extraction were wrong). If you follow such a strategy, your bets will be "correct" in a precise sense, as opposed to being "wrong".

[@anch95]

@@itellyouforfree7238 Depends on how you define misleading, I think "inept" is a better word.

[@johngalt517]

As soon as I realized he was saying "umm" I could no llonger really take in what he was saying. Good note for future

[@TheAperunk]

The subtitles are either computer generated or done by an extremely drunk person. While not being of much help, they are amusing.

[@TheRoyalInstitution]

These are indeed KZbin's auto generated subtitles. We are planning to transcribe all of our videos so that the subtitles would actually be useful rather than a strange experience in surrealist art. Most of our short videos are now transcribed but we don't currently have the resources to finish the longer ones! If you find time to lend a hand then it would be much appreciated - kzbin.info_video?v=kZTKuMBJP7Y&ref=share

[@michealroth120800]

Math is the universal language, if you didn't have it, you wouldn't have the words on your screen, or the computer itself XD

[@nicewhenearnedrudemostlyel489]

"universal human language"... You don't know what language the universe speaks.

[@AnitaCock]

@@nicewhenearnedrudemostlyel489 , BINARY! The TRUE UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE! kzbin.info/www/bejne/hXWacp6sibtjmq8 Or rather, FROM THE FUTURE!!! kzbin.info/www/bejne/qYO8nWSNdq6cqqc

[@justinjames3028]

I used to calculate the expected value of various games like keno and lottery. They were never below 1.0. I feel like I missed out not living in Mass and knowing this lottery existed. I feel like the roll-down would have triggered me to do the calculation on roll-down days. Whether or not I would have had the confidence to go out and buy a lot of tickets to make money is another matter, but my goodness there were easy millions for the taking.

[@robertschlesinger1342]

Excellent video illustrating how mathematical thinking was used to beat the Massachusetts lottery. Please post the letter from the Massachusetts Treasurer regarding this incident, or post where one can find this letter.

[@robertschlesinger1342]

Note that the aforementioned 25 page Letter from the Massachusetts Treasurer is available online at several websites and archives for the State of Massachusetts. Amazing but true story involving the ingenious use of mathematical thinking.

[@lurker1973]

This is the most happy mathematician in the world. I can't even imagine this guy gets ever saddened. I hope he doesn't do this during sex or on a funeral.

[@ryanvelazquez1231]

Even with the math I know, I am sure that I know that I'm unsure of everything

[@Hippiekinkster]

That's a good thing. If you were sure about everything, you'd be just like Donald Trump... wrong about everything.

[@missionpupa]

@@Hippiekinkster He was successful in business, then t.v. then was able to win a presidential candidate. Maybe you should think about that statement. Maybe he is only wrong in your eyes, just because he doesnt have your political view doesnt mean hes wrong.

[@adamkaidunnaustralia5158]

I used to be like that too. I did not believe in belief itself, so could not believe a I did not believe either or that it existed or did not. If you are unsure that you are sure about being unsure, my advice is to focus on increasing your information for analysis and in preparation for any possible outcome, whether it exists or not is irellevant I know now, your unsure feelings are valid but not as important as your drive and focus to pursue the best ways to learn and retain what you have learned. Learn as much as is possible instead of seeking assurance or truth primarily, and if you feel like you've reached a point where you can go no further then you can start learning how to do impossible things like being able to ignore limited ideas, where things being labelled with terms such as assurance or the lack of it are irrelevant, you don't need to be sure or believe to act on things as you might understand if you feel somewhat like I did... just act on your desires and if you find yourself desireless at some point then you'll better understand the value of feelings and actions anyway. Most will never know what it's like and will never appreciate or focus enough on just feeling happy in the moment or how their sadness or anger means they still have hope and a desire too better their circumstances some way or another. If you ever dispair then just act on basic instinct at that point, lisyen to your body and spirit more, they will guide your conciousness well if it has been trained and filled with useful infornation they can use to force you to instinctually improve your circumstances. Anyway that was my experience and journey i chose to take for years which led me to an Absolutely irrefutable discovery in the end, it was rough for a long time but it was worth the indecisive and unsure feelings all the more in the end. Until you are absolutely sure it's wise to be unsure and assume nothing and remove as much bias as possible. Although I might tell my younger self to not form too many ill concieved habitual routines if I ever speak to him again, not because I regret having had them but because I'm curious to know how things would've played out and if any signifucant differences occur lol

[@erictaylor5462]

Hardly any of the planes that come back hardly ever have bullet holes in the pilot, therefore, pilots are hardly ever hit when the plane is shot at. The thing is, when the pilot ends up with bullet holes the planes hardly ever get back.

[@ddabo4460]

Great presentation, very engaging and thought provoking , thank you RI!

[@onderozenc4470]

The most practical way to win in the lottery is to play the same most probable numbers in each draw for a long time.

[@kaen888]

interested to what the plane looks like with the 47 lottery numbers

[@85Spawn85]

Who wouldn't want to hear about the most wonderful languaje that we have!?!

[@cantavoidtrite]

This was great. Where is the Q & A?

[@shawnheneghan4110]

In the calculation of the expected value for the Mass Lottery, you used $2/6.8 for the contribution of winning a free ticket. But a free ticket isn't worth $2. As a first order estimate - as you point out - the ticket is worth 80 cents. Using simple feedback loop reveals the true value of a ticket as $0.59.

[@jimmonte9826]

What a coincidence! This video was published almost 4 years ago, and yours is the only comment I saw about it. I noticed the same thing only one day later. I computed the same return of 59.09 cents per ticket.

[@jimmonte9826]

Oops. I saw another person catch it 5 months ago. Search does not fully work in these comments.

[@loser-nobody]

Yes but just how many *um*s can one expect to hear in 48 minutes? I think we hit the jackpot here!

[@NoriMori1992]

Bertie Blue That's an unfair and false dichotomy. I was very interested and watched the whole thing. The "um"s still bothered me. The two are not mutually exclusive.

[@loser-nobody]

My comment was supposed to be a mathematical conundrum, though I can see why that wasn't perceived. It's been too long since I've seen the video but towards the end of it I started to ponder the probability of the word "um" being said in a prepared speech. Maybe if the speaker spent more of the 48 minutes talking in math I'd be distracted enough, like yourself, to not have any time to wander off topic. How unhelpful this is the first notification I get of any replies here...

[@bendanonfawkes4189]

with the lottery game i used, 123 - 234 - 345 - 456 - 567 - 167 - 256. the "random" numbers chosen were 5,6,7--1,6,7--2,4,5--1,3,4--. Jordan talks about geometry and intersecting lines as a way to guarantee which sequence of numbers will be picked, based off of Jordan's triangle you have the triangle base ____ 1,2,3. right side you have \ 3,5,7 and left side u have / 1,6,7 with 4 being in the center. if you change the points of intersection with a random number from 1-7 u are not guaranteed the same result. example being, triangle base ____ 7,6,5. right side \ 5,4,3. left side / 3,2,7 and the central number being 1. so my question is.. why and how are the numbers at the intersecting points chosen and why cant they be random?

[@lw1391]

Can anyone explain to me how the diagram works @42:15 - I got the rest of the lecture without any problems, and understand in general what he was doing. But that visual abstraction really lost me, and he didn't explain it well at all.

[@darumakabu3457]

I was thinking about to buy the book and then watched this video. Is it his book mostly talking about lottery? I thought I can get some math things that I can use in life.

[@agcwall]

You don't need any weird geometry to hedge your bets on the lottery tickets, this overcomplicates things dramatically. You just need to avoid picking the same numbers too much and not picking other numbers enough. As a programmer, I find this natural... as you generate tickets, just keep track of how many times you've picked each number, and always pick from the least-picked ones.

[@alfredhitchcock45]

He just wants to make things complicated

[@justinjames3028]

I feel like you wouldn't have to buy hundreds of thousands of tickets to get into a position where the standard deviation around the expected value was acceptably low - especially if taking the long-term approach.

[@davewhiteatpsynthase]

Great lecture, good students, fun time spent here.......

[@ElenaKomleva]

WAIT!! So why does it make sense to fill in lots of tickets by hand and not automatically?? I missed that part. Did someone invent an algorithm to pick random numbers that is more likely to win a lottery than mere chance?

[@VineyKumar]

No. The idea is that every combination of tickets has the same expected value (long run average amount of money you're going to make). However, some combinations can reduce the amount of risk (variance) more than others! Essentially, the MIT students were borrowing money, so they didn't want to EVER risk losing lots of money. So what they did was come up with a particular combination of tickets that (under the cash winfall rules) essentially guaranteed that they would make money by winning lots of minor prizes every time. The side effect was that it gave them less of a chance at winning the jackpot. The average amount of money they made would be the same regardless of what tickets they picked, but the MIT handpicked ticket combinations ensured they made steady returns rather than having more of a chance to lose money in each individual drawing. Hence all the advanced maths to come up with their handpicked numbers was used to guarantee the same return with less risk of a bad outcome. Of course, todays lotteries have a negative expected value, so using a strategy like that wouldn't help you win a normal lottery anyway- but it really helps in the Cash Winfall situation.

[@dustinking2965]

Is there a Q&A for this video?

[@TheRoyalInstitution]

Afraid not!

[@kparag01]

Wald has many contribution to statistics. Thanks

[@lancebaker1374]

At 0:43 "...about a mathematician named Abraham Wald who was a mathematician..."

[@MrLittlelionman]

...... “who was a mathematician that...” he was explaining who he was and what the situation was!!!! As in........ “Lance Baker is a bell end, .......a bell end who interrupts other people’s sentences and anecdotes because he craves attention and acceptance from his peers. Go watch something more on your level i.e. Teletubbies, button moon or challenge yourself and try Johnny Ball’s “think of a number” whilst struggling to come to terms with your social inadequacies knob cheese. ❤️🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿❤️

[@malaypatel1118]

Is it possible to get same logic and diagram representation for 4 number combination for set of 1to 20?

[@erictaylor5462]

18:00 "The State knows who is winning." Not necessarily. The State has the information on who is winning, but unless someone who has the big picture looks at the information then the State doesn't know anything. Remember, not all of the winning tickets are coming from the same store. Everyone who plays has the same chance of winning, so you are selling winning tickets from all the stores. You need someone who knows how many winning tickets are coming from each store AND you need someone who can see that these three stores are selling a lot more tickets than the others. *THEN* that person needs to understand what these three stores have in common.

[@AvatarJillian]

I LOVE MATHS. But this talk is the equivalent of when you get a penis enlargement pop up ad that takes an hour. It's just tedious and very few of the sentences are conducive to the point.

[@wpyoga]

+Avatar Jillian Well, I think he's very engaging...

[@uribad]

וט8םחייאאאא4654433קקטעעעע

[@rich1051414]

He talks like my mother, spends 3 hours talking about irrelevance, then 2 minutes getting to the point. I have the overwhelming desire to inch away slowly and gently shut the door...

[@robertschlesinger1342]

Great story about Abraham Wald, and great video.

[@araunapalm]

Lovely stories. Making logic and math interesting. He knows and loves his subject. The negative comments must be some form of jealousy....

[@ReasonableForseeability]

"Must be..." Bad logic or plain lack of imagination? Perhaps I'm jealous too - I'll never be able to say UM as often or as well as he.

[@araunapalm]

@@ReasonableForseeability mathematics is a language which one can explain things which is not possible to write in other languages. It is not reality but it can bring one closer to truth by analyses. Helps to get some clarity.

[@peterskove3476]

Hmm, but are we not gambling on the odds of the variation? How do you calculate that? That would be the odds right?

[@AbdulRehman-nu2pb]

Every one who's watching is either too young or too old!!!

[@clairecadoux471]

Abdul Rehman.....we are all wasting time

[@dlwatib]

The talk doesn't have anything to do with the title. How to eliminate risk is not at all the same concept as how not to be wrong. BTW: This sentence in the description is wrong no matter how you cut it: "Maths is the science of not being wrong, worked out through centuries of hard work and argument." Mathematics is a singular noun that happens to end in s, like hippopotamus. However, in the UK they teach that it is a plural and should be abbreviated maths, not math. But this sentence tries to have it both ways, with the plural s added to the abbreviation, but used like a singular noun agreeing with the singular "is the science..." Note that there is nothing mathematical about the rightness or wrongness of grammatical rules, among other subjects, so math can't possibly be "the science of not being wrong" in general.

[@malcolmbryant]

+dlwatib You could have found a closer comparison without going all the way to hippopotamus. Physics is singular and not plural also. Mathematics is not taught as a plural in UK. It's just abbreviated (sensibly imho) as "maths".

[@Lyanraw]

Super interesting. Although i think Jordan doesn't understand sterling. Dollars then corrected himself to Euros?

[@SiggiNebel]

The airplane story is a kind of variant of the steel helmet paradox: after the introduction of steel helmets in WWI the number of soldiers with head injuries rose, because because more soldiers now survived such injuries.

[@kathyyoung1774]

SiggiNebel Right. And there was no mention of protecting the pilot, which is most important of all.

[@historion]

Not what I expected from the title but fun and interesting... as expected from someone talking about how to win the lottery jackpot.

[@rainmaker704]

Great vid!

[@oliverizzard8751]

Yeah but when they say “why do you always have to be right” then you're wrong anyway.

[@mahuk.]

A bit late to the party but first time watching the video. I don't feel like the example with geometry is the best for the 7x3 grid since there's an easier way with less maths. Just pick each number 3 times and you will always get at least 3 correct deuces. Each one of your numbers will be in 3 different lines, and with overlapping your numbers are in 5 lines of the 7 lines of the grid. He did the same but in different order, so as long as you don't pick a number 4 or more times you can't lose in this game. 1 2 3 2 3 4 3 4 5 4 5 6 2 deuce 5 6 7 6 jackpot 6 7 1 2 deuce 7 1 2 1 2 3 2 3 4 3 4 5 4 5 6 5 6 7 2 deuce 6 7 1 2 deuce 7 1 2 2 deuce 1 2 3 2 3 4 2 deuce 3 4 5 2 deuce 4 5 6 2 deuce 5 6 7 6 7 1 7 1 2 1 2 3 2 deuce 2 3 4 2 deuce 3 4 5 2 deuce 4 5 6 5 6 7 6 7 1 7 1 2 I don't know if this applies to the original lottery with more numbers, but for the small one you really don't need geometry.

[@matchedimpedance]

The title of his book is wrong, grammatically. It says "How Not to Be Wrong" when it means "How to Be Not Wrong". Those are not the same.

[@venkateshbabu5623]

All numbers should be viewed as spins. No spin zero positive spin 1 and negative spin minus 1. And sum of all positive is inverted negative 12. All numbers are powers of some other.

[@venkateshbabu5623]

Twelve negative spins when put on an inverter gives quantum leap.

[@venkateshbabu5623]

That's the reason 144 is critical because it holds the power.

[@venkateshbabu5623]

That is the total number of possible universes.

[@mikejames2934]

Venkatesh babu ii

[@Hippiekinkster]

@@mikejames2934 - you are wrong. -1. (slow people: double entendre alert)

[@justinportillo242]

This looks like Sal from Impractical Jokers!

[@aristosxanthus514]

sounds like Berry from the Bee movie.

[@zenmaster7927]

Justin Portillo thinking same thing

[@XxMrRoachxX]

omfg I was not the only one thinking that :D

[@thushar0000]

I actually clicked on this video looking for this comment

[@granand]

Regarding the Book ..can a layman understand the maths in the books ..does it have references ..

[@vasukinagaraj]

Brillant, easily accessible, and containing a potent sociological subtext.

[@paxdriver]

Fun talk, he should do more.

[@RonDAvilar]

Interesting stuff

[@yves7778]

He really loves that lottery game. 😂😂

[@alanhaisley4870]

Obviously this is a case of selling below cost and making it up on the volume. :)

[@whitehistorymonth3563]

This video was okay. The worst part of it is the comment section. So many pseudo intellectuals.

[@Sebentheyargimachine]

If you guys have any info on how to get further knowledge on combinatorial design theory like youtube videos or tutorials, anything?

[@tyreekalexander1681]

"Ahm", "Ah", "Ahm", "Ahm" ... ?

[@Whispersfromtheshadows_]

Yeah if he only said ahm one more time..

[@erikziak1249]

You still can think that you are not wrong when you are mistaken. I am not sure about anything.

[@DavidAndrewsPEC]

+Erik Žiak (tramstefanikova) "You still can think that you are not wrong when you are mistaken" Yes. It's called the Dunning-Kruger effect. "I am not sure about anything." Being sure about something is not a bad thing - but only if one can roughly quantify that certainty.

[@somebodyelse5784]

You sure about not being sure about anything? If yes, you proved yourself wrong. If no, then why should anyone believe it to be true.

[@LanceGomez]

this guy gave them literally one minute (while still talking) to pick 7 sets of 3 numbers from 1 to 7 before asking for someone to call out. and flashed a set as well. I still didn't understand the transylvanian lottery until he'd gamed it once. Way to ruin an opportunity for fun interactivity.

[@farvision]

For a mathematician it's pretty horrible to hear him say "there was only two" english.stackexchange.com/questions/119954/there-were-only-4-versus-there-was-only-4

[@coolbeanz147]

This guy's trying to burn some serious calories through vocalisation.

[@bradleywilson2377]

Sean Pierce I know right?

[@dylanone8613]

HAHAHAHAHA

[@gkess7106]

Nerves.

[@janeadelaidelennox7193]

@@gkess7106 I doubt it. He's a professor. He does this for a living.

[@gkess7106]

Jane Lennox Doing it and speaking in public about it are two very different things