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Re:Parrondo's Paradox: How two ugly parents can make a beaut... by legaultmarc on Thursday August 23, 2012 @10:09AM (#4422409)
The author does say that the Parrondo's paradox only works if the games are not independent. It still is paradoxal that "A combination of losing strategies becomes a winning strategy".
Re:Parrondo's Paradox: How two ugly parents can make a beaut... by Dylan16807 on Thursday August 23, 2012 @01:58PM (#4423878)
It's only 'paradoxical' when the details of the games are sufficiently obscured.

If you word it as "a combination of losing strategies becomes a winning strategy" many people will be surprised and ask you to explain.

If you word it as "losing in A adds to the prize in B, so playing both beats the house" people aren't going to be impressed. note: used a simpler A/B mechanic than the blog post for illustration purposes

Re:Parrondo's Paradox: How two ugly parents can make a beaut... by Evbn on Thursday August 23, 2012 @04:10PM (#4424556)
That's what "paradox" is: when a simple model or explanation seems to show a contradiction, and a more sophisticated model is needed to understand the situation.
Re:Parrondo's Paradox: How two ugly parents can make a beaut... by Dylan16807 on Thursday August 23, 2012 @10:11PM (#4425883)
But in this case the 'simple model' is less 'simple' and more 'misleading'. Something should be a paradox without trickery. Someone hiding invalid division to make 1=2 is not a paradox. "Set of sets that don't contain themselves" is a paradox.