Am I a random person? If so, please let me know how many people will have existed between the beginning and end of the universe. Then I'll answer this.
;-) > -----Original Message----- > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On > Behalf Of Richard Baker > Sent: Saturday, February 23, 2002 3:31 AM > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; Brin-L > Subject: The Shooting Room Paradox > > > There is a room with a machinegun and a guy with two dice. A person is > taken into the room and the dice thrown. If they come up with two sixes > then the person is shot. Otherwise he or she is let out and a group of > ten people brought in. Again the dice are thrown and if they both come > up sixes then the people are shot. Otherwise a group ten times bigger > is brought into the room. This "game" goes on until a group is shot. > (There is an infinite supply of people. Nobody goes into the room > twice.) If you're taken into the room, what is the probability that you > get out alive? > > Argument 1. You are killed if two sixes are thrown. This happens 1 in 36 > times. Therefore your chance of getting out alive is 35/36 = 97%. > > Argument 2. Most people who are taken into the room are killed, > therefore you are very likely to die. For example, suppose the third > batch are killed. Then 100 people who go into the room die and 11 > survive. The chance of getting out alive is then 11/111 = 9.9%. > (Working out the true probability is left as an exercise.) > > Which of these arguments is true? What's wrong with the other one? (You > can make the situation even more extreme by making the probability a > batch is shot even lower.) > > Rich > GSV Matters Of Perspective
