15 ms·
This word you used, "independent" has a term in these kind of probabilistic systems, its called "memory". A system is memoryless if the next outcome is not depe
by friend_and_foe 3y ago
This word you used, "independent" has a term in these kind of probabilistic systems, its called "memory". A system is memoryless if the next outcome is not dependent on previous outcomes. A coin flip is such a memoryless system. The odds it will rain on a particular day is not independent of pervious outcomes; such a system is not memoryless. All the examples in your comment share this property and so the reasoning doesn't strictly apply to memoryless systems.
The author is not making this point, and early on, he calls coin flips "Markovian" which is synonymous with "memoryless". Independence is assumed in this article.
- SamBam 2y agoHow on earth is a Markovian system memoryless? It specifically depends on what state you are currently in. That's memory. Independence is not assumed in the "sticky" or "switchy" states in the article. The probability of the next flip depends on the previous flip.
- friend_and_foe 2y agoSpecifically, Markovian means that the probabilities of potential future states are dependent on the current state only. This is memoryless (more specifically, it has what's called the Markovian property) because no past states have anything to do with the next state. You're right about the article.