Sunday, September 7, 2008

I'm Telling You For The Last Time...

Okay, despite my declaration that I'd devoted enough time/space to this, I'm still getting messages arguing The Monty Hall Problem from odd angles, some disagreeing with what I said was the correct answer, some offering convoluted explanations of why it's right. I'm going to give this one more try. It's really a lot simpler than some people think.

You have a choice of three doors. Behind one is a car. Behind two are goats. You get to pick one and you'll win the prize that is behind it. You have no idea where the car is but your goal is to win it and not a goat.

After you make your selection but before that door is opened, the host (Monty) opens one of the doors you didn't pick to reveal a goat. Monty knows what's behind each of the doors and he always opens one to show you a goat. (This, by the way, is not exactly the way Let's Make a Deal ever worked.)

So now two doors have not been opened — yours and the one you didn't pick. Monty gives you the option of staying with your original door or swapping for the other door. Should you swap?

Yes, you should swap. Contrary to what you might think at first glance, it does make a difference. If you swap, you double your chances of going home with the car.

To prove this, let us consider the odds if you don't swap...

• One-third of the time, you pick the door with the car
• Monty opens a door that reveals a goat
• You don't swap
• You win the car

• Two-thirds of the time, you pick a door with one of the goats
• Monty opens a door to reveal the other goat
• You don't swap
• You win a goat

So one-third of the time, you go home with the car. Two-thirds of the time, you go home with a goat. Do we all agree on this? Fine. Now, here's the situation if you do swap...

• One-third of the time, you pick the door with the car
• Monty opens a door that reveals a goat
• You swap the door you picked for the other one that is not yet opened
• You win the other goat

• Two-thirds of the time, you pick a door with one of the goats
• Monty opens a door to reveal the other goat
• You swap the door you picked for the other one that is not yet opened
• You win the car

Got it? Two-thirds of the time, the swapper will go home with the car. That's because there's a one-in-three chance you'll start with the right answer and a two-in-three chance you'll start with the wrong answer...and swapping will turn the right answer into the wrong answer and the wrong answer into the right answer.

This is my final post on the subject. I hope.

• Posted at 11:58 AM · LINK

From the E-Mailbag...

Edwin E. Smith writes...

While I wouldn't base my vote on who is funnier, I think you can draw some conclusions about a person from their sense of humor. The comparison to picking a cute doctor versus a competent one is not entirely applicable. For one thing a sense of humor (in my opinion) is a sign of intelligence. I'm sure there are geniuses and savants with little or no sense of humor, but within the normal scope of human intelligence, my funniest friends are invariably the ones with the sharper sense of humor as well. And the second thing I think makes a sense of humor relevant is if McCain thinks "bomb, bomb, bomb Iran" is howlingly funny, to me that is a pretty good indication he is out to lunch.

Kennedy was fairly amusing, Nixon not so much, and I do think that what we laugh at says a lot about us as people.

Well, I've spent much of my life around some very funny people, including a number of comedians who are usually described with the adjective, "legendary." I disagree that a sense of humor is a sign of intelligence...or at least that it's usually a sign of intelligence. Even then, there are all kinds of intelligence. It's possible to be utterly brilliant at playing the clarinet but unable to balance your checkbook. It's possible to be very, very smart at math and very, very stupid about people.

I would also suggest that what passes for a sense of humor in a politician is often the skill of a good joke-writer on the payroll. An office-seeker doesn't have to be funny too often to get the reputation we're talking about here. It can be attained with a few good lines in speeches (scripted by others) and a few softball talk show interviews where the host obligingly sets up planned punch lines or the politician's writers predict accurately what will be asked.

Actually, I think McCain has been pretty funny on some shows, and a lot of it has seemed spontaneous to me. I don't think that makes him more or less qualified for high office. Jokes like the one you cite, however, demonstrate a serious lack of basic judgment. One of the most important things to understand about comedy is that it's often a function of time and place and of who says it. The "bomb Iran" lyric was kinda funny when The Capitol Steps did it years ago. It's just not that funny coming from a guy who might someday be in a position to actually bomb Iran or to influence the decision to do that. It was also scary that he seems to have just blurted it out on a whim without thinking. In the days to come, we're going to hear more about McCain's temper and impulsiveness.

Really, I can think of plenty of people I've encountered who were very funny and maybe even pretty smart about some things. They might even share enough of your life style and opinions that you'd think, "Hey, he's one of us." But if you put them behind the desk in the Oval Office, it would literally mean the end of civilization. They'd have us in a nuclear war faster than you could tell a knock-knock joke.

• Posted at 9:53 AM · LINK

Funny Man

Here's a press release that CBS has sent out...

Sen. Barack Obama to visit David Letterman on Wednesday

How funny can Barack Obama be?

You can find out when the Democratic presidential candidate visits "Late Show With David Letterman" on Wednesday.

It will be Obama's fifth visit to the show. Another guest will be LeBron James of the Cleveland Cavaliers and the U.S. Olympics men's basketball team, which won a gold medal in Beijing.

Here's my answer to the question posed: I don't care how funny Barack Obama is. I don't care how funny any person on my ballot is and I think voters are chowderheads if they allow that to matter in their selections.

If the guy's funny, great. That might be because he's disarmingly honest and unpretentious, which sometimes helps a leader be funny. But if so, it's the honest part that's a plus, not the funny part.

I want a president who'll know how to deal with the situations in Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan and other places where U.S. lives and interests are in deep, deep trouble. I want a president who'll work for a fairer distribution of the tax burden, who'll curb needless spending and bring down the deficit, who'll do something about the inefficiency and prohibitive expense of health care in this country, who'll approach environmental issues without the fear of costing some corporation a smidgen of profit, and who'll defend the Constitution and the Rule of Law and basic human rights for all.

If he or she can do some or all of that, I don't care if they're less funny than The McLean Stevenson Show. (That was the first TV show I worked on and it was not very funny.)

Conversely, if we want a president who'll be funny, let's elect Gilbert Gottfried or Lewis Black or one of those guys. Stephen Colbert tried to get into the race but they wouldn't let him.

Please...let's elect a president because he or she is smart and competent, not because they're funny or "he seems like one of us" or they look like they'd be fun to have a beer with. Giving someone points for being funny is like picking the surgeon who's going to perform your heart bypass because he's cute. It's really, really stupid.

• Posted at 12:52 AM · LINK

Today's Video Link

Hey, let's watch an old cartoon. This is "Piano Tooners," a Van Beuren effort starring Tom and Jerry. This is the human Tom and the human Jerry, not to be confused with the cat/mouse duo that later became famous in MGM cartoons by Hanna and Barbera. The cartoons of the human guys who went by those names were made from 1931 through 1933. The one you'll see if you click below was released November 11, 1932.

The most interesting thing about it is probably the attempt to create a character who's basically Betty Boop rolled into one. And why not? Ms. Boop was pretty darn popular in 1932. The voice of the knock-off here sounds like Mae Questel but is more likely a woman named Bonnie Poe. Questel was the main voice of Betty but others did it from time to time, including Bonnie Poe. (The same was true of Olive Oyl: Usually Questel but occasionally Poe or someone else.)

Van Beuren's Tom and Jerry were briefly popular but their success faded, as did their studio's. It shut down in 1937 and its library passed from hand to hand. At some point after the feline/rodent version became popular, the titles on the old Van Beuren cartoons were changed and Tom and Jerry became Dick and Larry...though not on all prints. When Sheriff John ran them on his Los Angeles kid show in the late fifties, they were still Tom and Jerry. This one is one I think I actually remember watching then. It's a little better when you're six years old and there are commercials for Bosco before and after.

• Posted at 12:45 AM · LINK