Patterns in Lottery Numbers

markmcb writes "Most everyone is familiar with the concept of the lottery, i.e., random numbers are selected and people guess what they will be for a cash prize. But how random are the numbers? Matt Vea has conducted a pattern analysis of the MegaMillions lottery, which recently offered a sum of $370M (USD) to the winner. Matt shows that the lottery isn't as random as it may seem and that there are 'better' choices than others to be made when selecting numbers. From the article, 'A single dollar in MegaMillions purchases a 1 in 175,711,536 chance of landing the jackpot ... a player stands a mildly better chance of winning a partial prize through the selection of weighted numbers.'" Includes some excellent charts of his analysis.

Comments

Re:And yet, one truth escapes the analysis

[Red Flayer]

You're already losing by buying the ticket.

From an arithmetical perspective, yes. From a more subjective standpoint, no.

Instead of using absolute dollar figures for your analysis, you should use lifestyle impact.

e.g. One dollar a week == no lifestyle impact; $370MM payout == off the charts lifestyle impact.

This is why people will continue to play the lottery, even if mathematically it's a poor choice.

Re:You can't lose if you don't play

[zerocool^]

One of the slogans for the Illinois lottery used to be "you can't win if you don't play", but I figured every time I didn't play, I won $1. Its both stupid and ironic that many of the same people bitching about taxes pay this voluntary tax!

At the astronomical odds against winning, I figure my chances of finding a winning ticket on the ground are only marginally worse than my chances of buying a winning ticket. So rather than give extra money to the government so it will be funnelled to politically connected rich people, I just watch the ground.


I play the Mega Millions every time the numbers are drawn. We have a standing office pool with 4 of us, and we play 4 numbers every time the balls are dropped, the same 4 sets of numbers each time.

What have we won? Well, one time we won $150. But aside from that, we know that the lotto money goes into the public school system. So, in effect, I'm donating $8 - $9 minus administrative fees to the school system every month.

I'm ok with that.

And on the off chance that I ever win the lotto, none of you will ever hear from my fat ass again.

~Wx

Interesting scam based on that

[A nonymous Coward]

I was quite amused when I first heard of it. I d onot know if it has ever actually been done, however.

Pick some random stock, send email to 2*10 suckers that it will go up, and to an equal number of suckers that it will go down.

Whichever direction it moves, divide that batch of suckers in two, pick some other random stock, send half email taht it will go up and half email that it goes down.

Repeat until you have only a few suckers left. They will see you as a genius who has correctly predicted the last {n} stock moves correctly. It may be the final sucker, or the last 2, or 4, etc.

Now tout a stock you have just bought and make some money!