Archive for July, 2009

hedonic treadmill avoidance

Wednesday, July 29th, 2009

There’s something awful about thinking that personal capabilities are strongly ordered – that for every two people with different capabilities, one of the two can do everything that the other can. This feeling is behind the aversion to taking money too seriously, because money is definitely strongly ordered. If money were everything, I’d either be better or worse than you, with no other possibility.

Thank god money isn’t everything then. More accurately, thank god prices do not completely represent my desire for things. If everyone had the same desires and productive abilities, then prices would indeed represent desires, but because of the different desires (demands) and productivities (supplies), there is much to gain from exchanging goods I produce with other people.

To the extent that people conform in their desire for scarce items, however, prices are inevitably accurate measures of personal demand, and it’s an endless rat race. To the extent to which prices of things are aligned with the degree what I want them, there is only one way to become happier – to make more money.

What is the most common hand in texas holdem?

Wednesday, July 29th, 2009

Drawing 5 cards out of a deck 100,000 times, I got

      1 SF
     23 4K
    110 FH
    220 FL
    412 ST
   2144 3K
   4706 2P
  42322 1P
  50062 HC

Drawing 7 cards out of a deck 100,000 times, I got

      5 SF
    181 4K
   2595 FH
   3016 FL
   4633 ST
   4907 3K
  17251 HC
  23565 2P
  43847 1P

One-pair becomes the most common hand!

See also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poker_probability

Risk adversity, flipped

Tuesday, July 28th, 2009

Hat tip: CMoh

http://www.playwinningpoker.com/poker/betting/

In heads-up poker games, if both 22 and AK were to go all-in pre-flop, they would be evenly (very close to 50/50) matched. In real play, however, 22 loses to AK by a big margin. This is because theĀ  betting and folding options are worth a lot more to AK than to 22, which is to say that the unknown flop, turn and river introduce big variances into the AK’s expected return.

In that sense, AKs are preferable because their riskiness boosts the value of options possessed.

Lesson: seek risk with respect to which you possess options!