Re:Optimizing Your Wife
by aliston on Friday April 02, 2010 @02:23PM
(#1237126)
I take issue with this step:
"Thus, as k increases, the left side approaches 1, and we can take the exponential of both sides to give..."
k/k-1 -> 1 in the limit.
The problem is that most people don't have an infinite number of women to choose from, so k/k-1 is likely NOT sufficiently close to 1. The algorithm then takes the exponential of both sides, making the matter worse...
So, based on the average number of serious girlfriends the average person seems to have before getting married (~4), the average person probably shouldn't pass on the first N / e... they should probably pass on something more like the first N / (e^1.3) or so.
"Thus, as k increases, the left side approaches 1, and we can take the exponential of both sides to give..."
k/k-1 -> 1 in the limit.
The problem is that most people don't have an infinite number of women to choose from, so k/k-1 is likely NOT sufficiently close to 1. The algorithm then takes the exponential of both sides, making the matter worse...
So, based on the average number of serious girlfriends the average person seems to have before getting married (~4), the average person probably shouldn't pass on the first N / e... they should probably pass on something more like the first N / (e^1.3) or so.