Coin matching and finger flashing were among the first formal games to arise in the history of gambling. The class of Morra games extends back to the pre-Christian era, although not until comparatively recent times have game-theoretic solutions been derived.

Richard Arnold Epstein

Categorized in : Games Christian Gambling

In our most Puritan of society, gambling-like other pleasures-is either taxed, restricted to certain hours, or forbidden altogether. Yet the impulse to gamble remains an eternal aspect of the irrationality of man. It finds outlets in business, war, politics, in the formal overtures of the gambling casinos, and in the less ceremonious exchanges among individuals of differing opinions.

Richard Arnold Epstein

gambling men war

From a rational standpoint, it might be expected that man should be far more willing to express financial confidence in his skills rather than risking his earnings on the mindless meanderings of chance. Experience, however, has strongly indicated the reverse proposition to hold true.

Richard Arnold Epstein

skills might men

A weakness of the random-walk model lies in its assumption of instantaneous adjustment, whereas the information impelling a stock market toward its "intrinsic value" gradually becomes disseminated throughout the market place.

Richard Arnold Epstein

information weakness lying

Reflecting an amalgam of economics, monetary, and psychological factors, the stock market represents possibly the most subtly intricate game invented by man.

Richard Arnold Epstein

psychological games men

Treatment of the apparently whimsical fluctuations of the stock quotations as truly non stationary processes requires a model of such complexity that its practical value is likely to be limited. An additional complication, not encompassed by most stock market models, arises from the manifestation of the market as a nonzero sum game.

Richard Arnold Epstein

whimsical arise games

The earliest full-length account of a chariot race appears in Book xxiii of the Iliad.

Richard Arnold Epstein

iliad race book

One of the oldest mythological fables tells of Mercury playing at dice with Selene and winning from her the five days of the epact (thus totaling the 365 days of the year and harmonizing the lunar and solar calendars).

Richard Arnold Epstein

calendars winning years

While no rigorous proof of an optimal strategy has been achieved, Robbins has proposed the principal of "staying on a winner" and has shown it to be uniformly better than a strategy of random selection.

Richard Arnold Epstein

winner strategy proof

Generally, a betting system for which each wager depends only on present resources and present probability of success is known as a Markov betting system.

Richard Arnold Epstein

wagers probability resources

The French philosopher Pierre-Hyacinthe Azaïs (1766-1845) formalized the statement that good and evil fortune are exactly balanced in that they produce for each person an equivalent result.

Richard Arnold Epstein

philosopher results evil

There are no conventional games involving conditions of uncertainty without risk.

Richard Arnold Epstein

conventional risk games

The essence of the phenomenon of gambling is decision making. The act of making a decision consists of selecting one course of action, or strategy, from among the set of admissible strategies.

Richard Arnold Epstein

gambling decision essence

A proven theorem of game theory states that every game with complete information possesses a saddle point and therefore a solution.

Richard Arnold Epstein

information states games

The assumption that individuals act objectively in accordance with purely mathematical dictates to maximize their gain or utility cannot be sustained by empirical observation.

Richard Arnold Epstein

individual assumption gains