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Greetings 405 listener!
The 405 airs over KMMR Radio Station. At 5 Minutes past 4 PM. Normally each M-F week day of the year. Here on the website we'll get it posted for you within a few hours, normally.
Your neighbor and website maintainer,
D.J. Rasmussen
I wanna again welcome you to the 4:05 Coffee Break. You ever get tired of that? Get your cup of coffee, glass iced tea, bottle of water, glass of milk. There. I switched it up.
OK Solberg:Let's see what's happening out there. Spring wheat, $6 and 4 pennies, $6.04 a bushel, 550 pounds steer calf, $3.95, Butcher Hog in Omaha, 63¢ a pound, and a 100 pound fat Lamb in Billings is worth $2.15 a pound. But guys, there's more, much more. Okay.
OK Solberg:Sometimes you think I'm talking seriously, and then I pull the rug out from under you and it's humorous. But today, guys, it's all straight up serious. Okay? I like numbers. I like probability.
OK Solberg:I do not like learning how to compute probability, but nonetheless I like it and I like observing it. Of course, poker is based upon probability, flipping a coin is also. Now if I say the odds show, I'm talking about probability. Probability is all around us. Just listen to the weatherman.
OK Solberg:There's a 70% chance of rain. That also means there's a 30% chance that it won't rain. But it's probability. A basketball player might make eight out of 10 free throws, so their probability of scoring is 80% from the free throw line. When the doctor says the medicine works in nine out of ten patients, the probability is ninety percent.
OK Solberg:Now if you're guessing on a multiple choice question with four possible answers, you have a 25% chance of accidentally getting it right. Oh, it's all around us. If you know two out of every 10 flights from an airport are late, you can guess there's a 20% chance your flight might be delayed. Okay. With that setting the stage, I want to tell you this.
OK Solberg:I call bingo nearly every Tuesday at the Rivers Bend facility. It's fun. Come join us. Seriously, no age requirement. 03:00.
OK Solberg:So I'm the caller, and I see the same numbers over and over again. The last game of the day is called blackout. In blackout, you have to cover every number on your card. There are 24 numbers on each card, not 25, because each card has a free space, you know that, in the middle middle, a row, n. Bingo has a total of 75 numbers.
OK Solberg:But here's the thing I'm fixated with. Listen. In a game of blackout, if there is just one card and only one player, well, first, you know, you'll win every single game because you're unopposed. But if you play only one card and you're the only player, the probabilities say out of 10 games, there will be at least three games where the player didn't get their blackout until the last ball. Really?
OK Solberg:When I heard that, I thought, wait a minute. Wait a minute. That doesn't sound right. But the more I checked, the more I found that it is correct. I was so taken with this probability problem case that I took the tumble tumbler full of balls home.
OK Solberg:I did. And I borrowed one card, and one card only, and I called, and Thea was the lone player, and we played blackout. We played three games, really and truly. Now I told my brother and he said, you have a good wife, which I agree with him. I do have a good wife.
OK Solberg:But I called three games of blackout bingo, and Thea was the sole player with only one card. Would you like to know what happened? On the first and second game, Thea didn't get a blackout until the second to the last ball was pulled. Game one and game two, Thea called blackout and there was only one ball left in the tumbler. On game three, she did not get blackout until the very last ball.
OK Solberg:I saw it with my own eyes. It's true. Probability worked, but it seems that it shouldn't be that way. Yet, if you think carefully, you realize just one number keeps you from winning. You could have 23 numbers on your card covered and only 30 numbers called, but you can't win until you get that last number.
OK Solberg:Now I told that to my friend Rachel and she said, yeah, it makes sense when you put it that way. We're not talking one out of 75. Listen guys, we're talking 24 out of 75. It truly is amazing to me. And I know many people will say, so who cares?
OK Solberg:Right? But it fascinates me. And thank you for letting me share that with you. I texted one individual those facts and they replied, okay. But not Rachel.
OK Solberg:She got into it. She understood it. But to a number kind of person, it's intriguing. It really is. And it's true and I proved it at home.
OK Solberg:And well, like Greg Kelp used to say, that and 50¢ will get you a cup of coffee. And 50¢ won't do it anymore. A bible verse and then the weekend is near, Ecclesiastes 9-11 Again, I saw that under the sun, the race is not to the swift nor the battle to the strong, but time and chance happen to them all. Ecclesiastes 9-11.
OK Solberg:Looks like Solomon knew about probability. So until next time, as you go out there, remember now, don't be bitter.