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Marilyn vos Savant and the Monty Hall Problem (2015)
31–40 of 331 posts
Re: Marilyn vos Savant and the Monty Hall Problem (2015)
#32I got the problem wrong because I didn't know he never opens the door picked nor a door with a prize behind it. That's because I hadn't seen the show since I was about 5 years old, because that's about the time I stopped watching daytime TV.
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Re: Marilyn vos Savant and the Monty Hall Problem (2015)
#33> Imagine that you’re on a television game show and the host presents you with three closed doors. Behind one of them, sits a sparkling, brand-new Lincoln Continental; behind the other two, are smelly old goats. The host implores you to pick a door, and you select door #1. Then, the host, who is well-aware of what’s going on behind the scenes, opens door #3, revealing one of the goats. > “Now,” he says, turning towar…
> Under those assumptions, the winning odds of the switching strategy equal the odds of your initial pick NOT being the car.
Only if there are three doors - or rather, only if the host eliminates all but two doors, one of which is the one you chose.
If there are, say, four doors, and the host eliminates one, your odds of success on switching are not 3/4.
Re: Marilyn vos Savant and the Monty Hall Problem (2015)
#34Am I the only person who wonders how "Marilyn Vos Savant" also happens to be the smartest person? If you didn't notice, "Savant" means smart. So is it just a coincidence? Karma? The pressure of carrying such a name drove her to smartness?
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Re: Marilyn vos Savant and the Monty Hall Problem (2015)
#35I never understood this one. Not choosing a new door seems like an implied 50/50 choice to keep your original selection.
edit: I know it works out on paper, but if I put myself in the situation, I know that if I decided not to choose again that is a choice and I am re-choosing the same door.
Re: Marilyn vos Savant and the Monty Hall Problem (2015)
#36I got the problem wrong because I didn't know he never opens the door picked nor a door with a prize behind it. That's because I hadn't seen the show since I was about 5 years old, because that's about the time I stopped watching daytime TV.
That is also in the problem description. Again, it doesn't matter whether he does or doesn't ever do it (though no game show host would ruin the game).
It is the described problem that matters.
There was so, so much writing like this at the time, people saying "well, if...".
Re: Marilyn vos Savant and the Monty Hall Problem (2015)
#37I never understood this one. Not choosing a new door seems like an implied 50/50 choice to keep your original selection. edit: I know it works out on paper, but if I put myself in the situation, I know that if I decided not to choose again that is a choice and I am re-choosing the same door.
I think that's what trips up most people.
I found working through it to be really rewarding, you might too.
Spoiler alert: consider how Monty's choices are constrained by what he knows, and how the player can capitalize on that.
Re: Marilyn vos Savant and the Monty Hall Problem (2015)
#38This is something I remember from the time. I could not grasp the probability maths (still shit at it, sorry Ms Von Savant) but I could write a program to experimentally demonstrate it, so I did. In QBasic. Because that's what we had and we were happy.
It was the 100-door variant (described in the article) that was my key to properly understanding the result.
Re: Marilyn vos Savant and the Monty Hall Problem (2015)
#39The intuitive way for me to understand the Monte Hall problem is to pretended there are 1000 doors. You pick 1. There’s a 1 in 1000 chance you get it right. The host then opens 998 doors that don’t have the prize. Do you keep your original or do you switch? Are the odds 50:50?
Re: Marilyn vos Savant and the Monty Hall Problem (2015)
#40[flagged]
> I, like many, stated “50-50” because the odds of getting one of two doors right is in fact 50-50.
Only if (in fact) it's an independent choice. It's not.
If the prizes had been juggled behind the curtain after one door had been opened, then you'd be right. But the "weird setup", which is the point of the puzzle, makes it clear.
Let's be real here: the point here for most of us is to think "oh it's 50:50", be proved wrong, enjoy being humbled, learn something new about how to interrogate a problem, and enjoy setting this puzzle to younger thinkers in the future.
Not to attack the (very closely-worded) description of the problem because you're upset to be wrong.
It's a probability puzzle and a character test for thinkers.