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113 points concerto | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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ipnon ◴[] No.42174774[source]
I just watched Patlabor 2 last night, about a civil war in post-Cold War Japan. The main theme is the following: The thing about one-in-a-million events is that they are eventually going to happen once the other 999,999 occur. Thus a government which does not plan for one-in-a-million scenarios is truly derelict and incapable of survival.
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xg15 ◴[] No.42175273[source]
> The thing about one-in-a-million events is that they are eventually going to happen once the other 999,999 occur.

Nitpick: I get your point, but phrasing it like this is basically the gambler's fallacy. That's not how probability works.

You could ask though if, given the changed environment, the one-in-a-million event still has the odds of one-in-a-million. Or if one-in-a-million is really such a rare thing if you make a billion draws...

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1. eiffel31 ◴[] No.42181930[source]
“Scientists have calculated that the chances of something so patently absurd actually existing are millions to one. But magicians have calculated that million-to-one chances crop up nine times out of ten.”

(The author is left as an exercise for the reader)