Quote Originally Posted by spoonitnow


Okay let's simplify like as much as humanly possible so that we don't have any more 5000-word posts searching for enlightenment in the area of pot odds. Tommy picks a marble from the bag. The odds against him picking a blue marble are 5:2 = 2.5:1. The chance of him picking a blue marble are 2/7 = 1/3.5 = 0.286 = 28.6%. In this example, we see that 2.5:1 = 1/3.5.
I've been reading this thread with wonder, amazement and consternation. Wonder that Chelle is doing so well so quickly, amazement at how simple Spoon has made the pot odds (with a sack of balls, ldo), and consternation that this topic confuses the hell out of so many people.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised. My math majors got angry with me when I refused to give them a formula for converting odds to probabilities and back again. I told them the idea, and they learned it just well (long) enough to derive their own formulas, then memorized the formulas and promptly forgot every freakin' helpful thing they'd learned.