The fifty-fifty chance

Tossers.

Two idiots, Matt and Louie, like gambling, but decide that if they bet against each other, they can’t lose. They toss a coin, the winner getting a pound. Louie keeps calling tails and Matt keeps getting heads. He switches to heads and Matt then gets tails. Louie thinks that the odds of such a thing happening must be slight, but Matt thinks they’re 50-50 every time.

Who’s right?

Matt. There are only two possible outcomes. I don’t know whether it’s possible to calculate the odds of a coin landing heads up n times in a row, but that’s a different thing. Also, the more frequently it lands with one side up has no effect on the event on the next occasion. It wouldn’t matter whether it’d been tails for the past hundred tosses, the odds of a head remain the same.

Tomorrow, there must be dogs on a planet orbiting Sirius. It stands to reason.

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