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Fair coins tend to land on the side they started (2023)

(www.researchgate.net)
399 points seanhunter | 3 comments | 19 Nov 24 09:03 UTC | HN request time: 0.4s | source
1. aquafox ◴[19 Nov 24 16:47 UTC] No.42185451[source]▶
FWIW, there is also a 2007 paper [1] that offers a physical explanation.

[1] https://www.stat.berkeley.edu/~aldous/157/Papers/diaconis_co...

replies(2): >>42185701 #>>42186179 #
2. hackernewds ◴[19 Nov 24 17:08 UTC] No.42185701[source]▶
as long as a machine is used for consistency*
3. seanhunter ◴[19 Nov 24 17:45 UTC] No.42186179[source]▶
That is referenced in both the paper and the video in fact. Apparently Diaconis presented a model which predicted about 51% preference for "Same side" and also did 2500 flips and said that about 250k flips would be needed to get 3 sigma of significance. So this paper decided to test it empirically and got to about exactly that number after 350k flips from a team of researchers.