Two Donkeys and a Million Bucks

[Tordon22]

The situation is different because you can't change cases after every round of eliminations. Wonder why?

-Zap


EDIT: I guess what I'm trying to say is that in the donkey example you have 1 chance in 3 of winning anything. But because you can still make 500,000 in deal or no deal they approach it from a different mathematic angle. Deal or no deal and the donkey game arn't so closely related. Here is a website where you can give the original question a try.

http://www.stat.sc.edu/~west/javahtml/LetsMakeaDeal.html

[crazyivan]

[Tordon22]

Argh, I've been shown the witty picture .

-Zap

[AWwrgwy]

The two things that make this confusing are:

1.  The "host" will always show you a donkey.  This makes the odds of the other two doors, one of which is yours 2 in 3 of having the $

2.  Rush said it best, "If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice." 
Meaning, if you switch you choose.  If you don't switch. you also choose.  50-50.



I have a headache


wrongway

[FireDrgn]

you have a  1 out of three chances if you pick one door....... YOU  only have qa 50% chance if you make a new choice...



think of it backwards  if you stay with you first choice  your chance is still 1 out of three even if your shown a donkey.....

hope this helps


Ill give you something else to think about that is counter intuative......... Your refigerator does NOT cool your food..... Can any one answer with what it does do?

[Barnes828]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mhlc7peGlGg&feature=related

 

[Bodhi]

three words.

Drugs are bad.

[68valu]

you have a  1 out of three chances if you pick one door....... YOU  only have qa 50% chance if you make a new choice...



think of it backwards  if you stay with you first choice  your chance is still 1 out of three even if your shown a donkey.....

hope this helps


Ill give you something else to think about that is counter intuative......... Your refigerator does NOT cool your food..... Can any one answer with what it does do?

removes warm air

[DieAz]

http://www.marilynvossavant.com/articles/gameshow.html

shows how switching is better odds.

[minke]

I reckon there's 3 donkeys and no money

[sluggish]

The airplane won't fly!

[druski85]

The airplane won't fly!

Ha!  Exactly.  Though I admit I didn't understand why it would at first...took me a bit to get that one.  This one I'm not sure I'll ever get.   

[AWwrgwy]

think of it backwards  if you stay with you first choice  your chance is still 1 out of three even if your shown a donkey.....

hope this helps

Think of it sideways.  Two doors.  One with the money, one with the goat. 

You pick a door and the host does nothing but asks if you want to switch.

How does this make your odds better to switch?  It's the same thing, isn't it?  The goat is behind one of the two remaining doors.  The same as when you originally picked.

With the three doors, they still open one of the goat doors no matter what.  So, in effect, the first pick is 50/50 too after they open the first goat door.

I get the 2 in 3 chance to pick a goat in the first round but like I tried saying with the "even if you don't make a choice" thing is, now there are two doors, 50/50 either way. 

Keep the original, 50/50. 

Choose the other, 50/50.

That's why I can't wrap my head around the "choose again" concept.


wrongway

[Larry]

There are three doors.  Behind one of those doors is a million bucks.  Each of the other two doors hides a donkey.  Here's how the game works:  You pick a door at random, and then I open a different door and show you a donkey.  You now have the option of keeping your original pick, or switching.  What should you do?

A)  Keep my original choice
B)  Switch
C)  It doesn't matter, the two options are equivalent

Sounds like someone just got done watching 21.

[bcadoo]

What is confusing everyone is that they think their odds go up to 50/50 after the third choice is eliminated.

Think about it like this:  You randomly pick one of the 3 choices, so your odds of getting it right are 1 in 3.  If you correctly picked, (which should occur about 1/3rd of the time) and you switch (which you should) you lose.  However, the odds are that 2 out of 3 times you pick the wrong one so that switching should give you a winning percentage of 66%. (TWICE your original odds of 1 in 3)

Clear as mud..