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Is Rishi Sunak the new Theresa May? – politicalbetting.com

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  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,774
    Nigelb said:

    rcs1000 said:

    kinabalu said:

    Re Alastair on cards, related but not at all the same, I have a party piece which goes as follows -

    Somebody shuffles a pack of cards and gives it to me. I hold it face down and start flipping them over, one by one and quick. Before each one, I predict Red or Black, and if I’m right I score a point.

    Beforehand I explain what I’m going to do and I ask people how many points they think I’ll manage to get. They say 26 or thereabouts. Why? I ask. Because it’s about a 50/50 chance each time, they say.

    And I go, well I bet you I get at least 33 and maybe even close to 40.

    Go for it, they say, and they crowd around excitedly (it’s a slow party).

    So I do, and I always meet my mark. Much admiration ensues. Quite rightly because only a minority of people can do this.

    As you know how red or black the remainder of the deck is, this doesn't sound very complicated.

    I will now run a thousand python simulations, and tell you what the expected number you should get is (given you always choose whatever is the value option).
    The trick is keeping count at speed, though.
    Ummm. It's just a single number, and it only goes up or down by one each card. So I reckon it wouldn't be that hard.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,774

    New Thread

  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 38,851
    Cyclefree said:

    Tulip mania is IMHO entirely understandable.


    Is that by the Heath or up in the Lakes?
  • MoonRabbitMoonRabbit Posts: 12,415
    ydoethur said:

    dixiedean said:

    JRM. "His Grace...is a true witness for Christ...I don't agree with him."
    Logically that makes him a non-believer in Christ doesn't it?

    Viscount Montgomery of Alamein:

    'Now gentlemen, as Our Lord said unto Moses and in my opinion quite rightly...'
    Sunday afternoon stroll to victory out there in the cricket Doctor Y. 😝

    My Dad has it on in his office, and 100% confident. I’m flitting in and out, spending a bit time outside here today. Took some wonderful photos on my girlfriend yesterday I was tempted to share. Sat in a field with lambs come across to say hello.
  • StillWatersStillWaters Posts: 6,773
    MattW said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    HYUFD said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Nigelb said:

    While I have sympathy with the sentiment, is it not unusual these days for God actually to issue rulings on such matters ?

    Rwanda plan is ‘against the judgment of God’, says archbishop of Canterbury
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/apr/16/rwanda-plan-is-against-the-judgment-of-god-says-archbishop

    Can HYUFD, who is our resident expert on what God thinks, pitch in ?

    Rwanda's main problem is it is full to the gunwales with Christians whose main takeaway from the bible is that God hates queers. I wonder what Welby thinks of that
    Homosexuality is not illegal in Rwanda.

    It is however in much of Muslim majority North Africa and the Middle East
    No, but outlawing it was debated by Parliament as recently as 2010

    Homosexuality is illegal under legacy UK colonial law in former colony and now majority Christian countries like Ghana and Malawi, so I really wouldn't be claiming this as a Christian vs Muslim thing
    Nice attempted pivot :smile:

    However, homosexual acts remain legal in Rwanda, which perhaps we should ignore the red herrings of Ghana and Malawi.

    (TBF, I'd be interested to know how they became legal in Rwanda, if ' legacy UK colonial law in former colony' usually makes homosexual* acts a criminal offence. Don't mention the intervening 50-70 years where laws could have been changed.)

    * Corrected a typo from "homosoxual", which would be interesting for some eccentric cityboys.
    Was Rwanda ever a British colony?

    I thought it was German and then Belgian?
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 38,851
    rcs1000 said:

    kinabalu said:

    Re Alastair on cards, related but not at all the same, I have a party piece which goes as follows -

    Somebody shuffles a pack of cards and gives it to me. I hold it face down and start flipping them over, one by one and quick. Before each one, I predict Red or Black, and if I’m right I score a point.

    Beforehand I explain what I’m going to do and I ask people how many points they think I’ll manage to get. They say 26 or thereabouts. Why? I ask. Because it’s about a 50/50 chance each time, they say.

    And I go, well I bet you I get at least 33 and maybe even close to 40.

    Go for it, they say, and they crowd around excitedly (it’s a slow party).

    So I do, and I always meet my mark. Much admiration ensues. Quite rightly because only a minority of people can do this.

    As you know how red or black the remainder of the deck is, this doesn't sound very complicated.

    I will now run a thousand python simulations, and tell you what the expected number you should get is (given you always choose whatever is the value option).
    Ah no, it's not complicated. But what I find interesting about it is you're dong the adjustment kind of subliminally as you flip the cards, and so it's a measure of that faculty. Different people get very different average scores after having a few goes.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 66,758

    ydoethur said:

    dixiedean said:

    JRM. "His Grace...is a true witness for Christ...I don't agree with him."
    Logically that makes him a non-believer in Christ doesn't it?

    Viscount Montgomery of Alamein:

    'Now gentlemen, as Our Lord said unto Moses and in my opinion quite rightly...'
    Sunday afternoon stroll to victory out there in the cricket Doctor Y. 😝

    My Dad has it on in his office, and 100% confident. I’m flitting in and out, spending a bit time outside here today. Took some wonderful photos on my girlfriend yesterday I was tempted to share. Sat in a field with lambs come across to say hello.
    I don't think Glos will stroll to victory. They've got quite a bit of work to do yet.

    Particularly since Yorkshire have been playing with 13 men...
  • Foxy said:

    If we are to talk about Johnson's "shrewdness" (which I agree with), can we discuss Keir Starmer's?

    For a man who apparently can't do politics, in two years he has removed Corbyn, taken over the NEC, essentially resolved the bulk of the anti-Semitism issue with praise from the Jewish community, abandoned all of the nutty Corbyn policies, regained Labour's image on NATO and defence and turned a 26 polling deficit into an 11 point lead. And now leads on the economy and best PM, things which Labour hasn't achieved in well over a decade.

    For a man who can't do politics, that's quite an achievement. And he did by essentially letting the idiots out themselves.

    And he's done the same for Johnson - and now Sunak. I think he's very, very clever.

    Indeed, he's also a shrewd, malevolent and malign figure.

    Hence why he was willing to stand in Jeremy Corbyn's Cabinet while his more principled colleagues resigned.
    I don't think SKS is malevolent or malign. Then again, I don't think Johnson is either. The way things stand I'll probably be voting LD for local reasons next month, but at any GE I'd be voting Labour.

    SKS's problem isn't that he's nasty, or malign, or even has particularly nasty or bad policies (of what we've seen so far). It's that he's bland. Grey. He needs some of that Blair magic.

    Then again, people thought Major was grey, and it turned out he was a bit more colourful than people thought...
    He lacks Blair's magic but one thing he shares with Blair and Boris is he's an unprincipled chancer who will throw anyone under the bus to further his own career prospects.

    While anyone decent in Labour resigned from Corbyn's Cabinet over the way Corbyn was treating Jews etc, as @CorrectHorseBattery correctly noted Starmer put furthering his own career ahead of any principles of willingness to stand up for Jews or anyone else.

    Like Blair and Boris he'll say or do anything, stand with or betray anyone, in order to put himself first. Which is why he's now where he is instead of someone with any principles.
    Depicting Starmer as anti-semitic when his wife is Jewish, and his children are being brought up in the faith lacks credibility.

    Indeed it seems to be one reason that he attracts so much hostility from the hard left.
    I don't think Starmer is antisemitic.

    I do think he was quite content to serve under an antisemite and in the front bench of what had become an antisemitic party under its then leader because he put furthering his own ambitions ahead of standing up for Jews.

    I think he knows and believes antisemitism is wrong, but was transactional enough to turn a deliberate blind eye to it for as long as that suited his own career path.
  • StillWatersStillWaters Posts: 6,773
    IshmaelZ said:

    Not sure if this has been posted but this must be terminal for Boris desire to remain in office

    The Prime Minister is accused of 'leading the celebrations' at rule-breaking leaving do...

    "The event expected to create the biggest headache was on November 13, 2020, to mark the exit of Lee Cain, the No 10 director of communications, which insiders say was instigated by Johnson. “This wasn’t a leaving drinks,” said one source — until the prime minister arrived. “This was the usual press office Friday evening wash-up drinks. Boris came fumbling over, red box in tow, and he gathered the staff around the press office table, which did have bottles of alcohol on it. “He said he wanted to say a few words for Lee and started pouring drinks for people and drinking himself. He toasted him.” A photographer is said to have been present throughout and is thought to have captured pictures of Johnson." - The Sunday Times

    Why?

    Why should X people having “usual wash up drinks” be any different to X+1 having drinks following a few words by 1?
    "Usual wash up drinks" is very interesting. It's a phrase completely unknown to google but the sort of thing people say in the hope their audience will nod sagely rather than admit to being too uncool to be unfamiliar with it. Cf "splash party."

    There is no such thing, if there were it would have been illegal anyway, and your x = x+1 argument doesn't really work either. The law permits you x spouses simultaneously where x=1, but x+1 is right out.
    The argument I would make is that the press team and Boris are an integral part of the same organisation.

    Either both are illegal or both are legal. I’m not sure that the addition changes the state. It sounds like someone trying to blame Boris specifically
  • StillWatersStillWaters Posts: 6,773

    23rd March 2020. Boris Johnson told TV viewers at his news conference: "If your friends ask you to meet, you should say No."



    Yes, people are sick of Partygate. But Boris Johnson broke the law and he misled Parliament. That's why he must go

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-10725003/DAN-HODGES-Yes-people-sick-Partygate-Boris-broke-law-Thats-go.html?ns_mchannel=rss&ns_campaign=1490&ito=1490

    The comments below are interesting. A pretty universal agreement that he should go with only the odd grifter saying "just a bit of cake" before being shouted down.

    When the Hate Mail readers are against you, its all over.
    Seems the only way he might go before the GE is if there is an absolute shellacking in early May locals.

    We can but hope.
    One of my Tory opponents is running as the "Unionist" candidate. No blue, no "Tory", absolutely zero mention of the party at all. We know its an absolute shellacking if my ultimate paper candidate non-campaign beats him...
    I presume from that there are other Tories running as “conservatives”.

    It would be interesting to know if there is a meaningful difference in performance on the night
  • StillWatersStillWaters Posts: 6,773
    Carnyx said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    HYUFD said:

    Foxy said:

    HYUFD said:

    Heathener said:

    And whatever happened to Rory Stewart? That was another extraordinary story.

    Which reminds me, please please please can a law be passed banning all Etonians from high office for the next one hundred years?

    So that would also exclude David Cameron and Douglas Hurd and Rory Stewart but not IDS, Gordon Brown or Priti Patel
    Justin Welby being excluded might appeal to Tories this Easter.
    I have no problem Welby speaking about protecting refugees, however as Tim Montgomerie says this morning I just wish he would also speak about protecting the unborn child
    https://twitter.com/montie/status/1515604145759305733?s=20&t=tIS81rXqQB2PxtJfLfJQ3Q
    Only faux-"Christians" like yourself get het up about abortion.

    On this day of all days surely even a pretendy-Christian like you might want to think about Christ's actual teachings. I can think of many of Christ's sermons about the poor and needy etc, even one about paying taxes, but not a single one from Christ himself about foetuses or any of the other nonsense you work yourself up about.

    Maybe Welby is inspired by the teachings of Christ himself in what he's speaking about, rather than whatever bothers you. But if he wants to shape politics, perhaps he should consider running for election.
    As long as we have an established church (and I know you disagree with that but let’s not get sidetracked on that discussion as it’s not the main point) ++Welby has a duty to speak up on national issues

    There are multiple verses on the Bible about helping the poor, the weary, the needy, so if you start from the perspective that all of these individuals are genuine asylum seekers we have a moral duty to assist (which doesn’t necessarily mean residence in the UK)

    The issue is that there are an indeterminant number of economic migrants mixed in and falsely claiming to be refugees. That is a purely transactional decision for the UK if someone adds value to the country.

    If anyone can come up with a way to distinguish between the two classes that would be fantastic. It would also be beneficial if the advocates of unlimited immigration didn’t spend their time making life difficult … I remember the case where they took the government to court for using dental examinations to determine whether individuals without papers were eligible for a scheme designed to aid children. If a scheme is designed to aid children it doesn’t seem unreasonable that there should be a mechanism to verify who qualifies rather than just taking peoples word as being true
    They should cut off an arm and count the annual growth rings.
    Teeth have growth rings IIRC. But significant uncertainty, I presume, so you can't use dental x-rays to say if someone is 18 precisely, surely? Was that the argument?

    You're thinking perhaps of the closure of the epiphyseal plates at th ends of the human long bones but again that is a gradual process from what I recall. Edit: also needs X-rays, so there is an issue there either way in terms of invasive medical procedures, and p[rofessional standards.
    X rays are non invasive

    IIRC there were some ludicrous cases - men in their 20s claiming to be 12/13. It may not be definitive but it’s another datapoint
  • StillWatersStillWaters Posts: 6,773
    Farooq said:

    HYUFD said:

    Farooq said:

    HYUFD said:

    Farooq said:

    HYUFD said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    HYUFD said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Nigelb said:

    While I have sympathy with the sentiment, is it not unusual these days for God actually to issue rulings on such matters ?

    Rwanda plan is ‘against the judgment of God’, says archbishop of Canterbury
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/apr/16/rwanda-plan-is-against-the-judgment-of-god-says-archbishop

    Can HYUFD, who is our resident expert on what God thinks, pitch in ?

    Rwanda's main problem is it is full to the gunwales with Christians whose main takeaway from the bible is that God hates queers. I wonder what Welby thinks of that
    Homosexuality is not illegal in Rwanda.

    It is however in much of Muslim majority North Africa and the Middle East
    No, but outlawing it was debated by Parliament as recently as 2010

    Homosexuality is illegal under legacy UK colonial law in former colony and now majority Christian countries like Ghana and Malawi, so I really wouldn't be claiming this as a Christian vs Muslim thing
    90% of the countries where homosexuality is banned globally are Muslim majority.

    Now plenty of Muslims are not homophobic but that is the fact
    Fact check: total lie

    There are 69 countries where homosexuality is illegal. 33 of these can be described as "Muslim majority" (I have included countries where the number of Muslims is slightly below 50% but still a plurality:

    Afghanistan, Algeria, Bangladesh, Brunei, Chad, Comoros, Egypt, Eritrea, Gambia, Guinea, Iran, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Malaysia, Maldives, Mauritania, Morocco, Nigeria, Occupied Palestinian Territory (Gaza Strip), Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Yemen

    Meanwhile, the other 36 are not:
    Antigua & Barbuda, Barbados, Bhutan, Burundi, Cameroon, Cook Islands, Dominica, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Ghana, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, Kenya, Kiribati, Liberia, Malawi, Mauritius, Myanmar, Namibia, Papua New Guinea, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and The Grenadines, Samoa, Singapore, Solomon Islands, South Sudan, Sri Lanka, Tanzania, Togo, Tonga, Tuvalu, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe
    They are mostly Christian, with some Buddhist, and one or two others.
    Certainly in terms of population the former is a far bigger group than the latter.

    50% of British Muslims also want to make homosexuality illegal in the UK

    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/apr/11/british-muslims-strong-sense-of-belonging-poll-homosexuality-sharia-law
    Of course, if it's positive attitudes towards homosexuality, you can't beat atheism.
    http://www.brin.ac.uk/figures/attitudes-towards-gay-rights/

    Religion holds us back. HYUFD, time to give up your bronze-age superstition.
    Stalin was an atheist, he made homosexuality a crime in the Soviet Union punishable by 5 years hard labour in 1933.

    There is no gay marriage in atheist majority China or North Korea either.

    In any case on your very link only a quarter of Christians in the UK oppose gay marriage now, in the US the Episcopal Church already conducts gay marriages but it should be up to individual churches
    Putin is a Christian
    He self-identifies as a Christian.
  • FarooqFarooq Posts: 10,775

    Farooq said:

    HYUFD said:

    Farooq said:

    HYUFD said:

    Farooq said:

    HYUFD said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    HYUFD said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Nigelb said:

    While I have sympathy with the sentiment, is it not unusual these days for God actually to issue rulings on such matters ?

    Rwanda plan is ‘against the judgment of God’, says archbishop of Canterbury
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/apr/16/rwanda-plan-is-against-the-judgment-of-god-says-archbishop

    Can HYUFD, who is our resident expert on what God thinks, pitch in ?

    Rwanda's main problem is it is full to the gunwales with Christians whose main takeaway from the bible is that God hates queers. I wonder what Welby thinks of that
    Homosexuality is not illegal in Rwanda.

    It is however in much of Muslim majority North Africa and the Middle East
    No, but outlawing it was debated by Parliament as recently as 2010

    Homosexuality is illegal under legacy UK colonial law in former colony and now majority Christian countries like Ghana and Malawi, so I really wouldn't be claiming this as a Christian vs Muslim thing
    90% of the countries where homosexuality is banned globally are Muslim majority.

    Now plenty of Muslims are not homophobic but that is the fact
    Fact check: total lie

    There are 69 countries where homosexuality is illegal. 33 of these can be described as "Muslim majority" (I have included countries where the number of Muslims is slightly below 50% but still a plurality:

    Afghanistan, Algeria, Bangladesh, Brunei, Chad, Comoros, Egypt, Eritrea, Gambia, Guinea, Iran, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Malaysia, Maldives, Mauritania, Morocco, Nigeria, Occupied Palestinian Territory (Gaza Strip), Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Yemen

    Meanwhile, the other 36 are not:
    Antigua & Barbuda, Barbados, Bhutan, Burundi, Cameroon, Cook Islands, Dominica, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Ghana, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, Kenya, Kiribati, Liberia, Malawi, Mauritius, Myanmar, Namibia, Papua New Guinea, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and The Grenadines, Samoa, Singapore, Solomon Islands, South Sudan, Sri Lanka, Tanzania, Togo, Tonga, Tuvalu, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe
    They are mostly Christian, with some Buddhist, and one or two others.
    Certainly in terms of population the former is a far bigger group than the latter.

    50% of British Muslims also want to make homosexuality illegal in the UK

    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/apr/11/british-muslims-strong-sense-of-belonging-poll-homosexuality-sharia-law
    Of course, if it's positive attitudes towards homosexuality, you can't beat atheism.
    http://www.brin.ac.uk/figures/attitudes-towards-gay-rights/

    Religion holds us back. HYUFD, time to give up your bronze-age superstition.
    Stalin was an atheist, he made homosexuality a crime in the Soviet Union punishable by 5 years hard labour in 1933.

    There is no gay marriage in atheist majority China or North Korea either.

    In any case on your very link only a quarter of Christians in the UK oppose gay marriage now, in the US the Episcopal Church already conducts gay marriages but it should be up to individual churches
    Putin is a Christian
    He self-identifies as a Christian.
    Not sure there's a difference
  • FarooqFarooq Posts: 10,775

    HYUFD said:

    Farooq said:

    HYUFD said:

    Farooq said:

    HYUFD said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    HYUFD said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Nigelb said:

    While I have sympathy with the sentiment, is it not unusual these days for God actually to issue rulings on such matters ?

    Rwanda plan is ‘against the judgment of God’, says archbishop of Canterbury
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/apr/16/rwanda-plan-is-against-the-judgment-of-god-says-archbishop

    Can HYUFD, who is our resident expert on what God thinks, pitch in ?

    Rwanda's main problem is it is full to the gunwales with Christians whose main takeaway from the bible is that God hates queers. I wonder what Welby thinks of that
    Homosexuality is not illegal in Rwanda.

    It is however in much of Muslim majority North Africa and the Middle East
    No, but outlawing it was debated by Parliament as recently as 2010

    Homosexuality is illegal under legacy UK colonial law in former colony and now majority Christian countries like Ghana and Malawi, so I really wouldn't be claiming this as a Christian vs Muslim thing
    90% of the countries where homosexuality is banned globally are Muslim majority.

    Now plenty of Muslims are not homophobic but that is the fact
    Fact check: total lie

    There are 69 countries where homosexuality is illegal. 33 of these can be described as "Muslim majority" (I have included countries where the number of Muslims is slightly below 50% but still a plurality:

    Afghanistan, Algeria, Bangladesh, Brunei, Chad, Comoros, Egypt, Eritrea, Gambia, Guinea, Iran, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Malaysia, Maldives, Mauritania, Morocco, Nigeria, Occupied Palestinian Territory (Gaza Strip), Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Yemen

    Meanwhile, the other 36 are not:
    Antigua & Barbuda, Barbados, Bhutan, Burundi, Cameroon, Cook Islands, Dominica, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Ghana, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, Kenya, Kiribati, Liberia, Malawi, Mauritius, Myanmar, Namibia, Papua New Guinea, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and The Grenadines, Samoa, Singapore, Solomon Islands, South Sudan, Sri Lanka, Tanzania, Togo, Tonga, Tuvalu, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe
    They are mostly Christian, with some Buddhist, and one or two others.
    Certainly in terms of population the former is a far bigger group than the latter.

    50% of British Muslims also want to make homosexuality illegal in the UK

    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/apr/11/british-muslims-strong-sense-of-belonging-poll-homosexuality-sharia-law
    Of course, if it's positive attitudes towards homosexuality, you can't beat atheism.
    http://www.brin.ac.uk/figures/attitudes-towards-gay-rights/

    Religion holds us back. HYUFD, time to give up your bronze-age superstition.
    Stalin was an atheist, he made homosexuality a crime in the Soviet Union punishable by 5 years hard labour in 1933.

    There is no gay marriage in atheist majority China or North Korea either.

    In any case on your very link only a quarter of Christians in the UK oppose gay marriage now, in the US the Episcopal Church already conducts gay marriages but it should be up to individual churches
    “ time to give up your bronze-age superstition HYUFD “. My politics and values IS DEFINITELY closer to HYUFD than yours to be honest Farooq.
    Yes, tell us something we don't know
  • NickPalmerNickPalmer Posts: 21,263
    Farooq said:

    Farooq said:

    kinabalu said:

    Re Alastair on cards, related but not at all the same, I have a party piece which goes as follows -

    Somebody shuffles a pack of cards and gives it to me. I hold it face down and start flipping them over, one by one and quick. Before each one, I predict Red or Black, and if I’m right I score a point.

    Beforehand I explain what I’m going to do and I ask people how many points they think I’ll manage to get. They say 26 or thereabouts. Why? I ask. Because it’s about a 50/50 chance each time, they say.

    And I go, well I bet you I get at least 33 and maybe even close to 40.

    Go for it, they say, and they crowd around excitedly (it’s a slow party).

    So I do, and I always meet my mark. Much admiration ensues. Quite rightly because only a minority of people can do this.

    spitballing here.. if you get two reds in a row, you keep guessing black until you get two blacks in a row. because the pairs of red and pairs of blacks will always match. am I close?
    I just tried this and I got 32/52
    I'd have thought you'd just keep track of the deck so far and predict whatever has come up least?
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 26,286
    kinabalu said:

    Re Alastair on cards, related but not at all the same, I have a party piece which goes as follows -

    Somebody shuffles a pack of cards and gives it to me. I hold it face down and start flipping them over, one by one and quick. Before each one, I predict Red or Black, and if I’m right I score a point.

    Beforehand I explain what I’m going to do and I ask people how many points they think I’ll manage to get. They say 26 or thereabouts. Why? I ask. Because it’s about a 50/50 chance each time, they say.

    And I go, well I bet you I get at least 33 and maybe even close to 40.

    Go for it, they say, and they crowd around excitedly (it’s a slow party).

    So I do, and I always meet my mark. Much admiration ensues. Quite rightly because only a minority of people can do this.

    That's totally out of this world.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 66,758
    @MoonRabbit

    Sorry I was snappish earlier. Between frustration at the lousy umpiring which cost Glos any chance in the match and a form I was trying to fill in that I was having all kinds of problems with due to poor formatting I was not in a good mood, but I shouldn't have spoken to you like that. Please accept my apologies.

    And FWIW I would rather promotion and relegation were decided on the cricket field, but it's becoming clear it isn't going to be.
This discussion has been closed.