What Is The Gambler's Fallacy
| Philosophy : Philosophy Definitions The gambler's fallacy is the conviction of some gamblers that the future probabilities must compensate for earlier outcomes. If they have lost ten races in a row, they are more likely to win the eleventh, for instance, than if this were their first bet. This is of course untrue. If a coin is not biased, even if you throw twenty heads in a row, the chance of the next coin toss being a head is still 0.5. The idea that the 'luck must change' is a very powerful pull on many people, however it must be explained through human behaviour and an inability to accept impartial probability, for there is no basis in fact for this idea - hence it is a fallacy. Many lottery players, after years of not winning, think that their numbers become more likely to come up each time - wrong! The idea that 'if I don't buy them this week the numbers will come up' is an appeal to sods law rather than cold, probabilistic fact!
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