Poker

What Poker Taught Me About Life

  1. “It depends…”
  2. There’s a difference between a good decision and a good outcome
  3. There’s a difference between being broke and having no money
  4. There’s a difference between a winning person and a winning player
  5. It’s all one long game
  6. The long run is longer than you think
  7. Inaction can be very risky behavior
  8. Embrace the beauty of uncertainty
  9. Objectivity is the only thing that’s impossible
  10. Whatever your “leak”, that’s what will get you in the end
  11. Luck and skill are two sides of the same coin
  12. Material wealth is a manifestation of interior wealth
  13. There’s time enough for counting… when the dealing’s done
  14. There’s no difference between value and values
  15. Your word is mightier than the law
  16. Win-win beats win-lose any day
  17. Trust everyone, and don’t count the cards

Decision Education Foundation

On Saturday I attended a fundraiser poker tournament for non-profit organization called DEF (Decision Education Foundation).  As it’s name implies, they are dedicated to helping individuals become better decision makers via the education system.  Their strategy is multifaceted, but their core goal at the moment is to introduce decision making explicitly into the curricula of primary and secondary schools around the country.  To do this, they first educate the educators on the components and process of making good decisions.…

Parrondo's Paradox and Poker

Parrondo’s paradox is the well-known counterintuitive situation where individually losing strategies or deleterious effects can combine to win…. Over the past ten years, a number of authors have pointed to the generality of Parrondian behavior, and many examples ranging from physics to population genetics have been reported. In its most general form, Parrondo’s paradox can occur where there is a nonlinear interaction of random behavior with an asymmetry, and can be mathematically understood in terms of a convex linear combination.

From Developments in Parrondo’s Paradox (Derek Abbott)