Every poker player has worse than average luck.

Call it the anti-Lake Wobegon Effect (aLWE).

This claim, at first glance, is entirely absurd.  Treating poker as a zero-sum game, one player’s good luck must be offset by another player’s bad luck, such that not all players can possibly have below average luck.  We learn this in kindergarten, and then again in advanced college mathematics.  So why am I trying to argue something that is patently absurd?  Below I will argue both why it is wise to believe aLWE, and also reasons why it may be true.

1. The utility of framing

Even if aLWE is false, believing it to be true probably makes you a better poker player.  I’ve written about this effect before, when  talking about basketball.  Many poker players, directly after an unlucky event occurs, play worse than they normally would.  Their unlucky outcome causes them to doubt themselves–why is this happening to me?  When you believe an event has a 12% chance of occurring, and then it occurs, and has negative consequences for you, you may feel like something is wrong with you.  If you instead believe that nothing is wrong with you, but instead that everyone has bad luck, it would presumably be easier for you to keep playing well, since your bad luck now proves you normal rather than proving you abnormal.  Thus even if you think aLWE is wrong and absurd, you may have reason to want to convince yourself it is true when you play poker.  I will now try to help you do this.

2. Almost everyone has worse than average luck

Accepting poker as a zero-sum game, mathematics allows that almost everyone could have worse than average luck.  It could even be that exactly one poker player has above average luck, and that every other poker player has below average luck, so long as you ignore groups of poker players that are completely isolated from the rest of the poker world.  For instance, maybe there are nine poker players in Brisbane, Australia who only play poker against each other and never have played against anyone else.  Then at least one of them has to have above average luck.  But if any one were to play poker online or at a casino, or to play against someone who had played online or at a casino, they would all become connected to the greater poker universe, and it would become possible for them all to have below average luck.

This dumbed-down version of aLWE has the advantages of 1) still allowing unlucky players to feel normal, and 2) avoid the apparent utter absurdity of the full-on aLWE.  Of course it is still highly improbably that, say, 99% of poker players would have worse than average luck and only 1% better than average.  It’s more likely that 70% of poker players would have worse than average luck, meaning that a considerable majority of players are in the majority with regard to luck.

3. Everyone perceives themselves to have below average luck

Many people are more likely to remember bad luck than good luck, due to a specific cognitive bias.  For instance, consider the following bad-beat story:

Player 1: So I’m all in on the flop with with a full house against a runner-runner straight flush draw.  Do you know what the odds are that I lose that hand?

Player 2: I’d say pretty close to 100%

Player 1: What?  No, it’s like 0.1%.  How do you figure?

Player 2: Well, I know this is a bad beat story, so the odds of you losing are not actually 0.1% like you think they are; they’re more like 100%.

Player 2 is able to infer based on the fact Player 1 is telling this story, that something unusual will happen.  When the above poker situation occurs, 999 times out of 1000, player 1 wins the hand, but then doesn’t choose to tell a story about it.  However, the one time out of 1000 that he loses the hand, he remembers it forever and tells everybody.

Recognizing that most players perceive themselves to be below average luck, and that they do so honestly (even if by flawed thinking), also allows poker players to feel normal when they feel unlucky.

4. The rake

When playing poker in a casino, there is a rake, a percentage of winnings taken by the casino.  This turns poker into a non-zero sum game, allowing the possibility that even if some players are above average luck, they’re not far enough above average to offset the rake.  Even ignoring the rake, playing poker takes time which has a cost, which also makes poker non-zero sum.

5. The game of life

While poker is thought to be a zero-sum game, there are many non-zero sum games in life, such as investing, dating, or conversing with friends.  It could be that some people are above-average luck in poker, but below-average elsewhere in life.  This allows for the possibility that everyone is, across all spheres of life, below average luck.

6. A cruel, cruel world

Even ignoring arguments 2-5, I would argue that it is entirely plausible that everyone in the world is below average luck at poker.  To understand why requires recognizing that there are situations in poker in which multiple players, each playing poker optimally, can reasonably expect that their play will lead to positive outcomes, when in fact this is not possible.  The combined value of each player’s expected winnings (given the information each of them has) exceeds the value that can possibly be won.  Similarly, there are situations in poker in which the combined value of each player’s expected winnings is less than the value that is ultimately won.  The total impact of these situations depends on their relative likelihood, which we generally assume is even, since dealing of cards is assumed to be random.

But what if dealing of cards is not actually random?  Or, more broadly, what if random events, such as sub-atomic randomness, don’t actually behave in neutral ways?  Randomness is posited as an explanation in cases where it is difficult to predict behaviors, but asserting that a behavior is random is to create a map, not to define the territory.  An alternative theory for unpredictable behaviors is that they operate mostly randomly, but that sometimes, due to the inherent cruelty of the universe, they deliberately behave in evil ways, so as to cause human suffering.

Note that under this alternative theory, rational analysis of history would likely lead observers to believe that poker luck-outcomes indeed are random, since they mostly behave randomly and only behave non-randomly in very specific instances where they’re able to do great evil.  In this scenario, most scientists would reject the (true) theory that the universe is evil, possibly invoking statistical significance.  Only some individuals, to whom acts of great cruelty had been committed by the universe at the poker table, would correctly recognize the cruelty of the world, and further the fact that all poker players have worse than average luck.

7. Conclusions

How people think about luck can affect outcomes, both in poker and in life.  There are a certain instances, such as when playing poker, when it may be beneficial to believe that everyone is unlucky.  There are a number of reasons why it is entirely reasonable to believe that everyone is unlucky.  Further, our current understanding of randomness, metaphysically, is not on as solid grounding as many people believe.  Poker players thus can, and probably should convince themselves that they, and everyone else they know, are unlucky.

You could plot a very simple version of this simulation on a grid, with each axis representing a property and dots representing each actor, or imagine a more complicated version in n-dimensional space.  Presumably, the simulation would play out by actors moving from their starting position and arranging themselves in better locations, eventually finding local maxima and remaining there, or at least creating fairly stable sub-optimal equilibria.

Now suppose you modify the simulation such that actors are suddenly able to access all of the information across the entire simulation.  Both rules and all other actors’ properties become immediately accessible to every actor.

With this change to the simulation, presumably two things would happen: drastic reorientation of actors, and vastly higher total utility.

If you haven’t yet guessed, the simulation is meant to describe humanity; the modification to the simulation is the advent on the internet and real-time communications networks; properties are physical location and things like political orientation, job skills, and membership in organizations, etc.  The point of the exercise is to try to illustrate just how significant this technological development is.  Humans have built our social framework premised on communication being expensive, and the entire framework now can be rearranged to exploit the fact that communication is essentially free.

In other words: this internet thing is going to be huge.  We’re only just starting to figure it out.

Pariser first became aware of filter bubbles when he realized he was no longer seeing his conservative friends’ posts and links in his Facebook feed.  He determined that this happened because he wasn’t engaging with conservative posts and links (by commenting on the posts or clicking on the links), leading Facebook’s algorithms to remove them on the basis that he wasn’t interested in them.  The problem, as Pariser sees it, is that Facebook’s algorithm removed content that he wanted to see.  The problem, as I see it, is that Pariser wasn’t actually engaging with the content he claims he wanted to see.  Facebook removed his conservative friends’ posts because it deemed, correctly, that he was ignoring them.

The internet represents a specific instance of the problem of filter bubbles, but it’s only a small slice of the pie.  In free societies, individuals define their media consumption.  We choose which books, periodicals and web-sites to read, which television shows and films we watch, who our friends are, where we live, what our hobbies are.  These freedoms present us with opportunities either to create filter bubbles by surrounding ourselves with like-minded individuals and agreeable ideas, or to actively seek out differing views, in order to challenge ourselves.  The first option is easier on us.  The second, I believe, is more rewarding, but also requires a certain amount of effort.

Here are some of the options that are available to Pariser upon realizing that his media consumption was tilted further to the left than he would like:

• Criticize Facebook and Google
• Search for a conservative blog or magazine to read
• Follow conservative thinkers on Facebook, Twitter, or Google+
• Write a note on Facebook, Twitter, or Google+ explaining that you’re interested in understanding for conservative viewpoints and asking your friends for suggestions
• Find the conservative friends that have been hidden from your Facebook news feed and start engaging with them

The first will get you a TED talk (and sell books).  The other four are technology-driven means of achieving the end that Pariser is aiming for–more balanced media consumption.

The internet can be a facilitator of the challenging task of seeking out differing viewpoints and confronting them.  It can also facilitate encapsulating ourselves in thought bubbles.  Ultimately, the control lies in our own decisions of which media to consume, not in the algorithms designed to help us.

I’m puzzled by this chart from the Brookings Institution‘s Hamilton Project, which attempts to predict how long it will take the United States to return to pre-recession level employment.  The chart plots three scenarios: a pessimistic option, in which employment grows at 208,000 jobs per month, as it did in 2005; an optimistic option, in which employment grows at 472,000 jobs per month, as it did in the best month in the 200s; and a middle option, in which employment grows at 321,000 jobs, as it did in 1994.  The takeaway from the graph, presumably, is that it will take a very long time to return to full employment.  The problem with the graph, is that its assumptions are entirely arbitrary, to the point that its predictions are largely meaningless.

The function of science, or social science is to use observed data to create theories that make predictions.  In this case, Hamilton is observing the period 1990-2008, a period of time that neither included nor followed a large recession, then theorizing that 2012-2025, a period of time that does follow a large recession, will behave like 1990-2008.  Hamilton is essentially saying that because job growth never exceeded 472,000 jobs per month when unemployment was low, it cannot possibly exceed 472,000 jobs per month when unemployment is high.  It’s just bad science, and it’s exactly the same bad science that failed to predict the recession in the first place.  Any scenario planning based on historical data leading up to 2008 would have deemed it impossible that employment would fall by 12 million from 2008 to 2010.  Why then, does Hamilton continue to use a forecasting method when that method’s limitations have been so clearly exposed?

I’ve felt for some time that Obama’s re-election is basically a lock, which makes the above question largely moot, but I realized that for all my time spent reading conservative commentators, I really haven’t seen a coherent conservative critique of Obama’s policy, or an explanation of why electing a Republican in 2012 would better serve conservative principles.  Conor Friedersdorf has criticized Obama’s security state apparatus along libertarian lines, quite validly in my opinion, but he hasn’t made much of a case that any Republican candidate would be better on civil liberties besides Ron Paul and Gary Johnson.

I understand the basic logic here, that the Republican party tends to support more conservative policies that the democratic party and that thus, voting for a Republican–any Republican–would advance conservative causes.  But my sense is that:

1. Contrary to the shrill cries of right-wing media, Obama’s policies really have been quite conservative, especially since the Republican party captured the house.
2. The republican party is likely to retain the house and to capture the senate.
3. The Bush presidency was pretty destructive both to the country and to conservativism, especially during periods when the Republican party also controlled the house and senate.
4. The Republican field is extremely weak, to the extent that the potential nominee could easily be as bad or worse than Bush.

Given these factors, I actually expected thinking conservatives like Millman to simply write off 2012 presidential elections.  Unless there’s a coherent conservative critique of the Obama Administration that I’m not aware of, why fight for the Romney-Perry-Gingrich smorgasbord when the guy in office is doing a pretty solid job?

Update: I may have misread Millman’s post as supporting his hair-brained scheme, as opposed to merely proposing it.  He says he’s likely to back Obama.

• 37,485: drug-induced
• 36,284: motor vehicle-related
• 31,228: firearm-related
• …
• 52: death penalty

By my math, I’ve already spent far too much time discussing the death penalty.  Feel free to call me a psychopath.

Next topic…

America is productive enough that it could probably shelter, feed, educate, and even provide health care for its entire population with just a fraction of us actually working.

-Phil at Transparency Revolution

It is possible to have an enjoyable life without earning and spending a whole lot of money. If health care and education are the areas where costs are growing, and if their marginal benefits are in doubt, then if you just get your basic needs met and focus on the enjoyment you get from the stuff that is not so expensive, you can do pretty well without a ton of money.

-Arnold Kling

I think a lot of us would rather not work for somebody else. It’s not necessarily that we’re burgeoning entrepreneurs eager to start small businesses. It just sucks to have a boss.

-Will Wilkinson

A job seeker is looking for something for a well-defined job. But the trend seems to be that if a job can be defined, it can be automated or outsourced.

-Arnold Kling again

What many, maybe most, people actually want, it turns out, is the creativity and autonomy of entrepreneurship combined with the stability of a 1950s corporate drone.

-Megan McArdle

These ideas are rattling around in my head.  Commentary to follow…