Examen de la regularidad de las órdenes empresariales desiguales

This is one of the great old bar bets. A classic if you will!

Freddy puts three whiskey tumblers in a row. Two are base up and one is mouth up. Freddy offers the following bet. You have turn two glasses at once.

You’re to do that three times. You have to end with all three glasses mouth up.

Freddy can do it every time but for some mysterious reason you will be unable to duplicate his actions. It may cost you quite a few dollar bills before you start to catch on!

Here’s how Freddy does it. The three glasses are set in a line with the end ones mouth down and the center one mouth up. First he turns an end glass and the middle glass. Then he turns both end glasses. Then he turns the two mouth down glasses (one at the end and one in the center) mouth up to complete the bet. He does this very swiftly to convince you that it’s the turns that win the bet.

The actual reason you can’t do it is simple lack of observation. Not the moves but the start position. Freddy sets the tumblers for you with the middle

one face down and the two end ones mouth up. With straight-sided shot glasses or tumblers this looks the same but the best you can do is finish with all three mouth down!

Freddy rarely lets honesty get in the way of winning, and he’ll do what-ever it takes to pick up the money. This bet (and swhat-everal others) can be seen on The Party Animal video tape from L&L Publishing.

Freddy, as you can imagine, has a huge collection of prop bets. If one doesn’t get the mugs biting he’ll move onto another one. One thing is for sure. The moment you show any interest, it’s going to cost you money.

I once asked Freddy, from a safe distance, if he’d ever lost a bet himself.

He admitted that he once lost money on a prop bet!

He’d been playing poker with a genial old man in Manchester in the vener-able lands of Great Britain. The old man had lost money, and Freddy was a happy camper. Then the old man offered a bet. He bet Freddy that he could bite his own right eye. Freddy was fascinated, the poke was small enough to cover the cost of learning the bet and so he accepted. The old man removed his glass eye and bit it. Laughs were heard around the bar; it was one of the old boy’s favorite tricks. Then came the line. He offered a big bet that he could bite his other eye. Freddy was so grossed out by the glass eye bit that he’d lost cognitive thought. He fell into the required track of thought by assuming that, since the guy had been playing poker all night, he couldn’t possibly have two glass eyes. After some considerable thought Freddy took the bet.

The old guy removed his false teeth and bit his right eye. Freddy puts that story forward as an example of the phrase, “You never stop learning.”

Perhaps the finest bar bet I’ve ever seen was shown to me by Todd Robbins (known, for some inexplicable reason, as Reno to Freddy). We were all sit-ting round a restaurant table and Todd put a small box on his plate. Inside the box, he told us, was something unique. It had never been seen by any human being before and, after one showing, would never be seen again. He offered us all the opportunity to be the only people in history to see this incredible item for a mere five dollars each.

How could we turn him down?

He opened the box and removed an unshelled peanut. He broke open the husk and showed us the nut. “This has never been seen before,” he said quite truthfully. Then he chewed and swallowed the nut before saying, “And it will never be seen again!”

Much laughter followed amidst general agreement that, that was easily a great five dollar value!

CHANCES AND ODDS

Before we enter the heady world of odds it may be useful to take a brief overview in what they actually are. Few people outside the gambling world

(and a surprising number within it) actually know the difference between odds and chance.

Chance is something the mug believes in with a passion. Although he doesn’t understand exactly what it is he has some vague idea that it has something to do with things happening over a period of time. The belief in lady luck has lost more than a few fortunes over the years. The poor lottery player who says, “Well somebody has to win, it may as well be me!” is a good example of this often misled fervor.

Odds are the exact probability that one event or another will happen. Or, to put it another way, the exact ratio between what will be paid against what will be bet. Knowledge and understanding of this ratio is critical to winning.

It is Odds 101 to know that there is only a theory of probability (chance) but a definite law of averages (odds).

Let me give you an example. If I toss a coin into the air it can land heads or tails. Assuming a perfectly balanced coin and no cheating the chance of a head coming up after a toss is 50-50. The odds are 1 in 2.

Or, to put it another way, if you have a BLT Sandwich once a week the chance of you having a BLT on any given day is 1 in 7. The odds are 6-1 against.

Chance often translates to luck to the mug. They act is if chance had an intelligence all of its own. Their theory states that a run of bad luck must surely be followed by a run of good luck, the, so-called, lucky streak.

If I toss a coin one hundred times and it comes down heads a hundred times I could get a string of people willing to bet stupid money that the next toss will produce a tail. The chance they will argue is high in their favor.

The odds dictate that it is still a 1 in 2 shot!

If you think that sounds silly then you should talk to the large number of gamblers whose entire Roulette system consists of waiting for red to come up six times in a row and then backing black to come up. They will argue (presumably on the assumption that the ball can ‘remember’ where it last fell) that it is more likely to do so. They forget that probability theory is calculated over an infinite number of runs and it is exactly this sort of think-ing that makes them poor in very short order.

Casino owners love these kinds of systems. Don’t be a mug. Forget chance and learn the odds.

Skilled knowledge of twisting the odds are what makes the following bar bets so strong. If you fail to learn the simple math involved you’ll forever be stuck with the rest of the sheep and, as Freddy says, “Ripe for a little shearing!”

Odd Odds

Even if you can’t work out odds very well at least you are slightly ahead of the game by knowing the difference between them and lady luck. By

twist-ing or concealtwist-ing the odds on a bet, the hustler can make a small fortune simply by winning more often than he loses.

A simple example. A coin is tossed into the air to fall either heads or tails (with a 1 in 2 chance of either result). If I offered you a bet where every time a head came down I would pay you a dollar but that every time a tail came down you would pay me three dollars it should be obvious that, if you foolishly took this bet, you’d go broke pretty quickly. Simply by twisting the odds (rather too openly here) I’ve given lady luck a big kick where it hurts the most. The problem with this bet as written is that it is obviously stupid.

However, by subtly twisting odds, people like Freddy have turned odds bets into an art form. Even if you don’t understand some of the calculations given here you only have to try the bets with a pile of play money to see how math suddenly becomes a lot less boring when it turns into a money-making machine!

1. The Seven Card Hustle

Freddy will take five red cards and two black cards from a pack. He will ask you to shuffle them and then, without looking at the faces, lay them out in a row along the bar. He’ll bet you that you can’t turn over three red cards.

Kindly man that he is, he’ll even explain how the bet is in your favor. The first draw is 5 to 2 (five red cards and two black cards) in your favor. The second draw is 4 to 2 (or 2 to 1 if you like) because there will be four red cards and two black cards left. The last draw is still in your favor by 3 to 2 (three reds and two blacks). The game seems heavily in your favor, but Freddy, for reasons you can’t see, is willing to offer you even money that you can’t do it! Should you take the bet?

No way!

He’s only given you the odds on a perfect winning draw while, rather forgetfully, leaving out all the other possibilities. The real odds (including all the losing draws) add up to a whacking 5 to 2 against you!

After you’ve felt enough pain of losing Freddy may turn the bet around.

He’ll try to pick out three red cards in a row. What a guy! Your pain will increase exponentially as he does it over and over again. Perhaps he also forgot to mention to you that he’s secretly marked the backs of the two black cards making them easy to avoid?

2. The Nine Card Hustle

This is Freddy’s follow up bet if the victim has any more money to lose after the first one has lost interest.

He takes two more red cards from the deck and adds them to the seven already in play. In his most genial way he explains that there are now seven red cards and only two black cards. You just can’t lose! He’ll ask you to shuffle up the cards and lay them out in a three by three square. He’ll bet

you even money that you can’t pick out a straight line (horizontal, vertical or diagonal) of three red cards. The odds seem to be staggeringly in your favor, what should you do?

You want my advice?

Run like hell!

The bet has subtly changed. You are no longer picking three cards at random but three cards in a line. There are only eight lines available (three hori-zontal, three vertical and two diagonal). If both black cards lay side by side in a corner then it’s an even money bet. In this position there are four winning lines and four losing lines. That’s the good news. Unfortunately this is the best break you can hope for. If one black card is at a corner and the other is in the center then there are only two winning lines against six losing lines.

All other layouts leave five losing lines to three winning ones. To make it even worse there are only twelve ways your fifty-fifty bet can happen but a total of twenty-two, count em and weep, ways (four of the six to two and eighteen of the five to three) that the odds will be well against you.

Still want to take the bet?

3. Elusive Queens

Freddy removes two kings, two queens and two jacks from a deck of cards.

Once more he’ll ask you to shuffle them and to draw two cards. He’ll bet you even money that one of them is a queen. Although the odds seem in your favor they are actually 3-2 against you. Not much but enough to sweeten you up for a bigger bet.

After you’ve lost a few times (and, because of the odds, you’ll lose more than you win over a period of time) you may start to get the idea that it’s easier than you thought to pick the queens. That’s when Freddy pounces and offers you 10 to 1 that you can’t pick both queens.

A good bet?

Only if you like bucking odds of 15 to 1 against. This is just like the obvi-ous coin tossing bet we described at the start of these prop bets but just more cunningly concealed. Are you starting to get the idea now?

4. Birthday Boys and Girls

This is one of Freddy’s favorite bets. I know because when he took me for fifty dollars with it he laughed so hard I thought his sides would split.

We were standing in a bar enjoying a drink when Freddy asked me my birthday. I told him and was ‘amazed’ to discover that his birthday was the same as mine. An astonishing coincidence! Astute readers will have already seen the hook sinking in here.

Your worst layout of the Nine-Card Hustle.

Freddy then offered to bet me that another two people in the room would share a birthday. He even offered me 3 to 2 on my money. At a rough guess there were around thirty-four or so people in the bar. I took the bet. I assumed, before I learned odds properly, that with around thirty people in the room and three hundred and sixty five days to share out the odds had to be about 12 to 1 in my favor! Boy was I wrong!

You see I wasn’t betting that two people would share a specific birthday but just that two would share any birthday. The odds calculation becomes progressive with each new person tightening in the figures sharply. It may surprise you to know that the odds become even money with just twenty-two people. With thirty-four people in the room Freddy had a huge 4 to 1 edge!

5. Tossing Coins

We’ve already seen from a naive example how tossing coins could be twisted into an odds bet. Here’s how Freddy works a scam using just the very same odds!

Freddy explains that the chance of a head or tail coming down after a coin is tossed are fifty-fifty (even money).

He then asks you how many heads are likely to turn up if a coin is tossed ten times. If you answer five (I did) you are well on the way to accepting a bet on it (I did) and losing your money (I did several times).

Freddy will even offer you 2 to 1 on your money that you cannot toss a coin ten times and get five heads and five tails.

Sure five heads and five tails will turn up more frequently than any other single combination (one head, nine tails for example) but the sum of all the other possibilities is much greater than the single five heads, five tails com-bination.

True odds are 5 to 2 in Freddy’s favor.

6. Aces Wild

Have you ever played Poker Dice? These are just like normal dice except that instead of spots they have card faces upon them, from nine to ace. They are very popular in bar games until Freddy pulls this little number.

He’ll tell you that aces are wild (they can stand for any value), and you are to roll them out (there are five dice in a set). Every time you roll a pair Freddy will pay you, every time you roll three of a kind you pay Freddy. Of course everybody knows it’s harder to roll three of a kind but Friendly Freddy will offer

you even money on the bet. A set of poker dice.

Take the bet and you may as well just hand Freddy your wallet. With aces wild it’s easier to roll three of a kind! Freddy has odds of 3 to 1 working in his favor!

7. Money Madness

Freddy asks you to remove a bill from your wallet and to screw it up with-out looking at it. He offers you even money that you can’t guess three with-out of the eight digits that make up the serial number of the bill. You must guess three with no misses. This would seem to be in your favor as you only have to pick three from eight! But don’t forget that lots of serial numbers have repeat figures (such as C10026202D, for example, which is a number, a great one for this bet, on a dollar bill taken at random from my wallet). And don’t forget those zeros! Here are the true odds for you.

All numbers different—a mere 2.15 to 1 in Freddy’s favor One duplicate figure—3.42 to 1 for Freddy

Two duplicate figures—6 to 1 for Freddy Three duplicate figure—12 to 1 for Freddy Getting good isn’t it? Well, for Freddy anyway!

Four duplicate figures—30—1 for Freddy Five duplicate figures—120 to 1 for Freddy Getting the idea?

Freddy often does this bet with his own money. He’ll screw up a five dollar bill and offer the bet. If you take it you’ll be highly pleased when you win.

The bet is repeated with another five dollar bill and you’ll win again. If you could only walk away right now, but the bet seems so easy!

Freddy only has a fifty dollar bill left. It would be a shame to quit while you were ahead wouldn’t it? This poor old chap has had one drink too many and is giving away money isn’t he? It’s a great bet for you, isn’t it? Your first guess is wrong! Freddy offers you double or nothing that you still can’t do it. You already know that one of your first numbers was wrong so this time it’s a cinch, isn’t it? You lose again and are suddenly ninety dollars out of pocket. I guess Freddy just got a lucky break huh?

You see Freddy has a fifty dollar bill with the number 88888558 on it. I pointed out to him that this meant he couldn’t lose. “Really?” he said, “And I just thought that it was a lucky note!”

8. Three Lucky Piles

Freddy gets somebody to shuffle a deck of cards and to cut it into three piles.

He offers to bet even money that a court card will turn up on top of one of the piles. The logical mug will work out that Freddy has twelve winning cards (four jacks, four queens and four kings) against forty losing cards. He

figures that the odds must be about four to one against Freddy on a pile. So, in his mind (and Freddy may help him along by explaining all this) Freddy would need four piles to make it an even bet. With three piles it’s in the mugs favor. Right?

Wrong!

This bet has cost people who should know better considerable sums of money. We’ll be looking at some of the math in detail later on but here’s a quick preview of why hustlers carry calculating machines with them. To understand this bet you must first realize that you are effectively picking three

This bet has cost people who should know better considerable sums of money. We’ll be looking at some of the math in detail later on but here’s a quick preview of why hustlers carry calculating machines with them. To understand this bet you must first realize that you are effectively picking three