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Re:Coin Flip Brain Teaser by tome on Friday July 24, 2009 @10:55AM (#721537)
That calculation shows that after 500 flips your expected profit is $10, which is not the same as the question that was asked.
Re:Coin Flip Brain Teaser by bradlane on Friday July 24, 2009 @12:00PM (#721698)
because your calculation assumes that out of 100 flips, heads always gets 51 out of 100, which is not how probability works - it's not linear (for lack of a better word).

It's possible to be up $10 in just 10 flips, just as it's possible to be even at 1,000,000 flips (though neither very likely, but possible!). Also, the question asked "with a 99% certainty", which your answer doesn't take into account.

If you had a coin that when flipped had these odds, and you wanted to try this out, your answer of 500 would be a good rough estimate, but not the answer.

Re:Coin Flip Brain Teaser by bsaunder on Friday July 24, 2009 @11:46AM (#721660)
You didn't include the work required for the 99% confidence interval that the original post asked for. It requires statistics, not simple math.
Re:Coin Flip Brain Teaser by madcaptenor on Friday July 24, 2009 @12:22PM (#721763)
Statistics is math.
Re:Coin Flip Brain Teaser by Nwallins on Friday July 24, 2009 @01:22PM (#721937)
It ain't simple.