5 ms·

On a related note, the biased coin is the unicorn of probability but it's physically impossible: http://www.stat.columbia.edu/~gelman/research/published/diceR

On a related note, the biased coin is the unicorn of probability but it's physically impossible: http://www.stat.columbia.edu/~gelman/research/published/diceRev2.pdf http://www.stat.columbia.edu/~gelman/research/published/dice...

delecti 6y ago
With the important caveat that you catch it, rather than letting it bounce and land.
- dragontamer 6y ago
  If I catch a quarter, I can often feel the heads or tails side and flip it without most people noticing. I'm not quite perfect at it, but I'd say I'm at 90% heads / 10% tails, as long as its an old-school quarter and not any of these newer ones with crazy designs on the back. (I can feel the Eagle vs Washington's Head pretty well. But the 50-states and stuff are too much for my fingers to memorize. Give me a few minutes with the coin beforehand, maybe I can learn on the spot... if the back is distinct enough from Washington's head). Its a fun party trick, to remind people that you need to let the coin bounce on the ground if you want a fair toss. If you let someone "catch" the coin, you're prone to all sorts of shennanigans.
  - oh_sigh 6y ago
    I used to do that in grade school to win coin flips. Flip the coin, catch it, feel for heads or tails, and depending on what you want present it by either simply opening your fist, or revealing it by flipping it onto the back of your other palm.
    - thaumasiotes 6y ago
      Ah, that sounds like a different exploit. Above, you can fiddle the result of a coin toss by sleight of hand. Here, you're not dexterous enough for that, but you can fiddle the result anyway by alternating between two processes. This is a more powerful approach! There was an example of this that stuck with me in the (fantasy) book Another Fine Myth, in which the narrator must perform magic for a king, but lacks the ability to do magic. He has a single gimmick device and needs to pass it off as more than it is. So he asks the king to choose one of two horses, and, when the king picks the real horse, says "by your word shall that creature be spared". Then the narration remarks that if the king had picked the other (fake) horse, the trick would have been performed on "the creature he [the king] had doomed with a word". The lesson is, if you're offered a choice, you need to know what it is you're choosing before you make the choice. Participating in a process without knowing what the process consists of is another way to say "being scammed".
      - dragontamer 6y ago
        > Here, you're not dexterous enough for that, but you can fiddle the result anyway by alternating between two processes. This is a more powerful approach! What you're describing is called "Magician's Force", and its certainly a powerful component of many tricks. But a lot of people are wise to that, so you need to have a backup plan. Or, you can rely purely on slight of hand / dexterity to get things done. -------- Really, a good magician uses all the tricks in combination with each other. If you "lead" with Magician's force, some members of the audience think you're just doing psychological tricks. If you "lead" with dexterity tricks, then by the time you pull out Magician's force, you can trick them into thinking your magician's force was another dexterity trick.
  - RHSeeger 6y ago
    Its actually quite easy to toss a coin into the air so that it's rotating while not perpendicular to the ground, but not flipping over. It will land with the same orientation it was tossed into the air with. However, to an observer, it looks like it's flipping.
- scoot_718 6y ago
  Just like you do with dice.
deleted 6y ago
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delecti 6y ago

With the important caveat that you catch it, rather than letting it bounce and land.

dragontamer 6y ago
If I catch a quarter, I can often feel the heads or tails side and flip it without most people noticing. I'm not quite perfect at it, but I'd say I'm at 90% heads / 10% tails, as long as its an old-school quarter and not any of these newer ones with crazy designs on the back. (I can feel the Eagle vs Washington's Head pretty well. But the 50-states and stuff are too much for my fingers to memorize. Give me a few minutes with the coin beforehand, maybe I can learn on the spot... if the back is distinct enough from Washington's head). Its a fun party trick, to remind people that you need to let the coin bounce on the ground if you want a fair toss. If you let someone "catch" the coin, you're prone to all sorts of shennanigans.
- oh_sigh 6y ago
  I used to do that in grade school to win coin flips. Flip the coin, catch it, feel for heads or tails, and depending on what you want present it by either simply opening your fist, or revealing it by flipping it onto the back of your other palm.
  - thaumasiotes 6y ago
    Ah, that sounds like a different exploit. Above, you can fiddle the result of a coin toss by sleight of hand. Here, you're not dexterous enough for that, but you can fiddle the result anyway by alternating between two processes. This is a more powerful approach! There was an example of this that stuck with me in the (fantasy) book Another Fine Myth, in which the narrator must perform magic for a king, but lacks the ability to do magic. He has a single gimmick device and needs to pass it off as more than it is. So he asks the king to choose one of two horses, and, when the king picks the real horse, says "by your word shall that creature be spared". Then the narration remarks that if the king had picked the other (fake) horse, the trick would have been performed on "the creature he [the king] had doomed with a word". The lesson is, if you're offered a choice, you need to know what it is you're choosing before you make the choice. Participating in a process without knowing what the process consists of is another way to say "being scammed".
    - dragontamer 6y ago
      > Here, you're not dexterous enough for that, but you can fiddle the result anyway by alternating between two processes. This is a more powerful approach! What you're describing is called "Magician's Force", and its certainly a powerful component of many tricks. But a lot of people are wise to that, so you need to have a backup plan. Or, you can rely purely on slight of hand / dexterity to get things done. -------- Really, a good magician uses all the tricks in combination with each other. If you "lead" with Magician's force, some members of the audience think you're just doing psychological tricks. If you "lead" with dexterity tricks, then by the time you pull out Magician's force, you can trick them into thinking your magician's force was another dexterity trick.
- RHSeeger 6y ago
  Its actually quite easy to toss a coin into the air so that it's rotating while not perpendicular to the ground, but not flipping over. It will land with the same orientation it was tossed into the air with. However, to an observer, it looks like it's flipping.
scoot_718 6y ago
Just like you do with dice.

deleted 6y ago

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