Coin Landing on its side

[bloodhound]

When u flip a coin . there are three possible events

 

E1= Head

E2=Tails

E3=landing on its side

 

now P(E3) must be really small. but even if its small, imagine the number of times coins have been flipped!!!. there must have been a coin landing on its side.

 

Just wanna know if there is any record of that ever happening.

[Sayonara]

Isn't there also a chance it will be intercepted and swallowed by a labrador?

 

I'm pretty sure that has probably happened in the past.

[YT2095]

c`mon Sayo, that`s hardly helpfull to the chap

 

try some of these, they MAY be uselfull:

http://users.frii.com/davejen/coin3.htm

http://mathforum.org/library/drmath/view/52225.html

 

and this one just for fun: http://sln.fi.edu/fellows/fellow7/mar99/probability/gold_coin_flip.shtml

 

for further searches try in google: "coin landing on it`s side" probability

and: "coin landing on its edge" probability

[Dave]

[url']http://sln.fi.edu/fellows/fellow7/mar99/probability/gold_coin_flip.shtml[/url]

 

"...and flipping the coin so quickly it would gain orbit . . . even more difficult to accomplish)"

 

Now that's one I hadn't considered

[YT2095]

the daftest one I encounted and quite satirical was flipping the coin and having it attacked by terrorists

[Dave]

rofl

 

When you actually think about it, there's almost an infinite number of things that could happen to the coin - most just have infinitely small probabilities

[Sayonara]

Oh yeah, and mine isn't helpful even though it's a possibility and can have a p attached to it, but terrosists attacking the coin is at all likely.

 

YT, my post was directing bloodhound to the fact that he said there are "3 possible events" rather than stating that there are 3 landing outcomes. I'd rather leave it up to him to decide if that's a useful pointer to him or not.

[YT2095]

Oh yeah' date=' and mine isn't helpful even though it's a possibility and can have a p attached to it, but terrosists attacking the coin is [i']at all likely[/i].

 

That came much later in the thread and related to a DIFFERENT aspect.

 

YT, my post was directing bloodhound to the fact that he said there are "3 possible events" rather than stating that there are 3 landing outcomes. I'd rather leave it up to him to decide if that's a useful pointer to him or not.

He did at the end of his post clarify that his intention was about the landing of the coin and not what happened in mid air!

[Sayonara]

That came much later in the thread and related to a DIFFERENT aspect.

Missing the point: Priceless.

 

He did at the end of his post clarify that his intention was about the landing of the coin and not what happened in mid air!

Exactly which phrase says that to you?

 

Actually don't bother answering that or this is just going to degenerate into one of those interminable lengths of straw. The fact is you made a judgement about the value of my post without actually understanding why it was there. I don't see any point arguing over it.

[YT2095]

now P(E3) must be really small. but even if its small' date=' imagine the number of times coins have been flipped!!!. there must have been a coin landing on its side.

[/quote']

 

keyword "LANDING"

[Sayonara]

keyword "LANDING"

Yes, linked to P(E3).

 

Jesus.

[YT2095]

Exactly which phrase says that to you?

the one I just told you. "LANDED"

 

Ezekiel!

[Sayonara]

See post #11.

[YT2095]

see post #8

[bloodhound]

dont blame each other . Blame me!!!

 

anyway thnks for the answers. gonna toss a coin 100000000 times and see if i can get a result.(i dont think ill live long enough to do that)

[YT2095]

it wasn`t your fault at all

 

but as you`ll see in one of those links I gave you, there is a method to work out the probability of an edge/side landing

[swansont]

the daftest one I encounted and quite satirical was flipping the coin and having it attacked by terrorists

 

Assuming this happened randomly, would it affect the outcome of the flip?

[YT2095]

Assuming this happened randomly' date=' How could it not? LOL

 

would it affect the outcome of the flip?

I would certainly expect so, as I pressume it wouldn`t LAND to give an outcome/result

as you`ve probably guessed, I don`t know how to do this cut and slice up of quotes still, but the colors are fun

[Connor]

I have had a similar thing happen to me.

 

For my stat class, I had to flip a paper clip and see which side ended up ~100 times. Lo and behold, one time it landed on its edge! I couldn't even balance it there when I tried to! totally screwed up my results.

[H2SO4]

Interesting. Are you lying?

[rakuenso]

unless your paper clip has square edges and it just happened to be not rotating while in mid-air, i find it extremely unlikely

[Connor]

I am not lying. I was absolutely astounded by it, but it happened, with a normal flip and a normal clip. I couldn't even make it balance like that by placing it.

[BenSon]

I have had a similar thing happen to me.

 

For my stat class, I had to flip a paper clip and see which side ended up ~100 times. Lo and behold, one time it landed on its edge! I couldn't even balance it there when I tried to! totally screwed up my results.

How did you tell which side was up?

[Connor]

well I oversimplified the problem for clarity, but I think I've just muddled things.

 

It was a bent paper clip (think of an L), and it could land with one side up or both sides on the ground. However, one time I flipped it and neither side was on the ground, but the paperclip was balanced on the tips

[Lyssia]

During a maths lesson in primary school in which we were flipping coins and doing other prob-related stuff, my coin landed on its edge. The girl I was working with and I just sat there and gawped before telling our teacher, who didn't believe us. It was seen by one other kid, and for the rest of the lesson and the lunch break afterwards the three of us tried to recreate it.

 

Of course it all gets simplified, otherwise prob textbooks wouldn't talk about P(head) = P(tails) = 0.5. This is why I prefer something like algebra (in the main): simplifications make me nervous.