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- Title
GAMBLER'S RUIN? SOME ASPECTS OF COIN TOSSING.
- Authors
Johnson, Porter W.; Atkinson, David
- Abstract
What is the average number of coin tosses needed before a particular sequence of heads and tails first turns up? This problem is solved in our paper, starting with doubles; a tail, followed by a head, turns up on average after only four tosses, while six tosses are needed for two successive heads. The method is extended to encompass the triples head-tail-tail and head-head-tail, but head-tail-head and head-head-head are surprisingly more recalcitrant. However, the general case is finally solved by using a new algorithm, even for relatively long strings. It is shown that the average number of tosses is always an even integer.
- Subjects
PROBABILITY theory; COIN tricks; GAMBLING; WINNING &; losing (Contests &; competitions); ALGORITHMS; RINGS of integers
- Publication
Mathematical Scientist, 2010, Vol 35, Issue 2, p111
- ISSN
0312-3685
- Publication type
Article