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Get Those Brain Cells Working: The Monty Hall Problem

posted by janrinok on Friday July 29 2016, @10:27AM   
from the something-to-think-about dept.

An Anonymous Coward writes:

Suppose you're on a game show, and you're given the choice of three doors: Behind one door is a car; behind the others, goats. You pick a door, say No. 1, and the host, who knows what's behind the doors, opens another door, say No. 3, which has a goat. He then says to you, "Do you want to pick door No. 2?" Is it to your advantage to switch your choice?

Do any of you have any noteworthy experiences where knowledge of math helped you in an unusual way?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monty_Hall_problem

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Original Submission

• Re:This is a classic problem (Score: 2) by TheRaven on Friday July 29 2016, @05:56PM

  by TheRaven (270) on Friday July 29 2016, @05:56PM (#381635) Journal

  See my other reply to the parent, but the short form: If you pick correctly the first time, then switching will make you lose. If you pick incorrectly the first time, then Monty must close the one other door that is incorrect, so switching makes you win. You have a 1/3 chance of picking correctly the first time, a 2/3 chance of picking incorrectly. By switching, you flip those odds so you win if you picked incorrectly the first time and lose if you picked correctly.

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  sudo mod me up

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