Luck be a lady?
therealbrandonwilson • 7 Feb 2024 •
A former coworker called me to catch up. He actually works for my client and usually only reaches out when he has a SQL conundrum.
He told me that his nephew's wife works at the local Fry's grocery store. She noticed that an Asian guy came in almost every day and bought Pick 3 lotto tickets. For this particular gambling delight, if you pick the correct three numbers in the correct order, you can win $500 for a $1 ticket. This guy has won multiple times and shared his numbers for tonight's drawing with her. She told her husband, who told his uncle, who told me. Maybe the Asian guy is very lucky, or maybe he's uncovered some slight edge to tilt the odds in his favor.
I was reminded of when my dad was studying historical lotto numbers and attempting to game the system. I don't recall how successful he was, but he was very much into it at the time. Of course, the whole thing is supposed to be completely random. Here's what ChatGPT says about the topic:
Predicting the next set of numbers in a lottery drawing is not possible, regardless of any historical lotto number data provided. Lottery drawings are designed to be completely random, ensuring that each number combination has an equal chance of being picked in every drawing. This randomness means that no pattern or prediction algorithm can accurately determine the next set of winning numbers based on past draws.
First of all, nothing is completely random. If lotto numbers were completely random, then there is the same chance of picking the same number sequence the following day as any other random number. Yet, how often does this happen? Clearly, certain scenarios are more likely than others, especially considering there is a physical mechanism used to select the numbers. But they have to say it's completely random to satisfy the gambling regulators.
Just like they have to post that nicotine is an addictive substance above the shelves containing tobacco products. If this is true, why don't we have a segment of the population jonesing for eggplant, which has a surprisingly high natural nicotine content?
So I bought some tickets on the off chance that an Asian guy somehow has lady luck on his side.
Comments
Update: I didn’t win last night. So much for the Asian lottery mystic.
In Austria, gambling of that kind is State regulated, so there are notaries in place that ensure the numbers are picked randomly by the “machine” (here is a link to the crazy contraption https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c7kpGbr2cXY). So in “Lotto 6 aus 45” (6 out of 45) you have to hit 6 numbers out of 45 which totals up to 8,145,060 different combinations. Considering only two drawings per week, it would (statistically speaking) 78,317 years to have each combination at least once. The thing that makes it seem pseudorandomly seems to be based on the “Zwei-Drittel-Gesetz” (two thirds law). Sadly, I only found a German Wikipedia entry for it: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zwei-Drittel-Gesetz
Here another German Question on Quara regarding that: https://de.quora.com/Warum-werden-manche-Zahlen-beim-Lotto-häufiger-gezogen-als-andere-wenn-doch-die-Wahrscheinlichkeit-für-alle-Zahlen-gleich-ist
Here is a translation of the Answer:
The effects of the two-thirds law are omnipresent and also manifest themselves in lottery draws. The two-thirds law means that, on average, around 16 or 17 numbers are drawn more often than they are mathematically entitled to, around 16 numbers as often as they should and around 16 or 17 numbers fall out of the drum less often.
Looking at all previous draws since 1955, 49 is the favourite. As of today, it has been drawn 468 times. The runaway favourite is 13, which has only reluctantly rolled out of the drum 345 times so far.
Because there have only been very few draws since the start of the Saturday lottery in relation to the results of other games of chance such as roulette, lotto as a game of chance must be viewed in a differentiated way.
In the past, around 100,000 roulette balls were thrown at a table in a casino each year. Compare this with the few lottery draws that have been held over more than half a century. Average results always require a sufficient number of events.
So to define if it was truly random, we would have to wait those 73k years to have a look at the statistics.