Theres a 50/50 chance of:  Getting hit by a bus, while swimming, getting hit by a plane while crossing the road.  Either something will happen or not.\nThere is not a 1:million chance of winning lotto, theres a 50/50 chance. You either will or you wont.
217822
Yes i can say there are so many events that you can believe 50/50 chances.\n\nAs you said 50/50 is calculating for 100. means you have 2 chances.\n\n1. Toss the coin: to get head or tail you have 50/50 chance\n2. If a women is giving birth: the baby may be BOY/GIRL 50/50 Chance\n\n3. for this question : someone give the answer: which is correct/not correct   50/50 chance.\n........... \nyou can find somany events which are having 50/50 chances
125228
It is just pure luck.  The best way to win is to be rich enough to buy tickets with every one of the possible number combinations.
38965
Most likely, yes.  Unless you bought the exact same kind of ticket from the exact same role before them in the exact same store, it wouldn't throw it off at all.  The odds of one person buying a ticket and throwing off who won the lottery, let alone winning it themselves are very very slim.
302660
Let us make the following assumptions\nAn average person meets n donkeys in his/her lifetime\nAn average person buys m lottery tickets\n\nMy search for carnivorous donkey resulted in 143,000 hits on google.\nMy search for winning the lottery resulted in 14,900,000 hits on google.\nLets assume that this roughly the ratio of meeting carnivorous donkeys to winning the lottery.\n\nSo your chance of being eaten alive by a donkey as against winning a lottery is = (n*143,000)/(m*14,900,000)\n\nSo unless you meet 104 donkeys for every lottery ticket you buy, your chances of winning the lottery are possibly higher :-)\n\nI decided to solve this problem mathematically since this is a math forum. Any other place, I would say, you need to check with Shrek on how he won the princess (a lottery for him?) and avoided getting eaten by the Donkey!!
520533
Taking on a national lottery does seem a little foolish.\n\nThe payoff is about the same as the US lotteries (55%), but the fact that the that there is always a winner would mean that there are no huge pots to win. These huge pots seem what  brings in the large number of players in the US lotteries.
123210
I went last yaer and I would agree w/ everything you thought mite be true.  I think people go to those things to get themselves pumped up on some kind of false hope.  People who go to these things are the same people who buy lotto tickets KNOWING they are going to win.
657891
It's completely luck. The pick three game is allot easier to win though because it's only 3 numbers. Therefore, if you play it 8 times a week you'll win more than the normal lottery. The only way that tracking numbers would be useful is if they used the same number balls and machine each time. If the same numbers consistently came up it might be because of defects in those balls, and by picking those numbers it would increase the odds of winning. However, I believe that they change all of that stuff all the time, which would make the number-tracking scheme useless.
589525
I wouldn't want to know my future!  I am a worry wart... that could be dangerous for me!  lol... but winning a big lottery would be nice...LOL
11476
If you did not enter any sweepstakes chances are it is a hoax. The other day I received an email said someones plane crashed and I was the only living family and I had 2 million coming to me, but they wanted my bank account number. I mean these are just ways to steal your money not to give you any.
534882
Yes, if you win the lotto or audition for a TV show like Deal or No Deal, Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, Show Me the Money, or others, you can be a millionaire. If you work hard and advance at work, or came up with an invention, it could happen to you. The odds are you win the lotto or on TV is slim, as the same goes for a hot idea. Stick to working hard at work and don't quit.
267784
1 in 176 million for for each ticket you buy the Mega MIllions game.\n\nSuperObots idea that it is about 1 in 39 shows the level of innumeracy that people have that allows this "voluntary tax on the non-thinker" to thrive as it does.\n\nYou wanted to see "work":\n\nThere are 56 possible number for each of the first five choices in this game (56 balls number 1 thru 56)\n\nSo the chances of getting the first number right are 1 in 56.  Second number on its own is also 1 in 56.  But cahnces of getting both right are 1 in (56 x 56)\n\nChances of getting all five right are 1 in (56 x 56 x 56 x 56 x 56)\n\nIn this game there is a sixth ball chosen from 45 balls, so the chances of getting them all are 1 in (56 x 56 x 56 x 56 x 56 x 45)\n\nBIG NUMBER.\n\nFat chance.\n\nOdds are much, much much better that you will be struck by lightning (about 1 in 800,000)\n\nSo you are about 200 times more likely to be struck by lightning than to win this lottery! (Around 1000 folks a year get struck by lightning, and about 10% of them die!)
399633
Scam.... Same as email scams... If you didn't enter a lotto you can't win anything. It's that simple.
569175
If they are asking for money for full details then it is a con. Otherwise it is just another hairbrained theory.\n\nThe odds for every draw remain approx 14 miilion to 1 for each line you purchase.\n\nit is very easy to baffle people with numbers, particularly when dealing with probabilities because what frequently seems common sense is actually wrong. \n\nFor example how many people do you need at a gathering to have a 50/50 chance that two of them will share the same birthday. Common sense would state to many that you would need about 183. However you only actually need 23.\n\nIf someone is quoting odds at you and asking for money then leave quickly.
285970
it depends on the odds.
676402
It is the fastest way for you to lose any money in your bank account.\n\nI win 3-4 lotteries a day. Funny I never entered any.
328651
Statistics and probability aren't used to predict what future events will occur.  Based on simulation (e.g. throwing dice), statisticians can assign likelihood estimates to events.  In no way does probability estimate what event will come next.  We'll leave that to professional gamblers.  Probability is concerned with what happens in the "long run." \n\nYou say all things have a 50/50 chance of occurring - do you win the lottery every other time you play?  Do you get in a car accident every other time you drive?  You should re-think your 50/50 reasoning.\n\nStatistics isn't just probability - statisticians design studies, run clinical trials, program computers, ensure quality in industrial processes, and many other valuable tasks.
528649
The only way to fail to win at least one prize is to loose each time.\nThe probability that you will loose one time is 1 - 0.11 = 0.89.\nThe probability that you will loose 5 times is 0.89^5.\nSo the probability that you will win at least once, or fail to loose all 5 times, is 1 - 0.89^5 = 0.44