Ever thought you could train yourself to call heads or tails correctly? Get ready to dive into the intriguing world of coin tossing as we debunk the 50-50 myth. Alongside unveiling the science and strategies behind a successful coin toss, we'll also address the variables involved, from the force used to flip the coin to the surface it lands on. Whether you're looking to decide a friendly dispute, or want to dip your toes in the realm of odds and probabilities, this episode promises fascinating insights into the perfectly balanced world of flipping a coin.
Stepping away from the orderly precision of coin flipping, we delve into the chaotic and controversial world of Catalan's creation: a banana duct-taped to a wall. We'll not only explore what makes this piece art but question its value, its message, and Catalan's nonchalant attitude towards its consumption. As we navigate this unusual artwork, we challenge you to rethink your definition of art and question the role of museums in driving prices for such pieces.
Art, as they say, should feed the soul. But when it literally involves food, the line becomes blurry. We'll wrap up this episode with a thought-provoking discussion on the implications of using food in art, especially against the backdrop of world hunger. What does it mean to spend exorbitant amounts on perishable artworks while millions starve? Let's examine this through the lens of Catalan's piece the "Comedian". So switch on your curiosity and tune in as we transition from probability theory to modern art criticism in one single episode - you won't want to miss it!
https://www.wikihow.com/Flip-a-Coin
https://daily.jstor.org/statistics-of-coin-tosses-theater-geeks/
https://allthatsinteresting.com/maurizio-cattelan-banana-eaten
Ever thought you could train yourself to call heads or tails correctly? Get ready to dive into the intriguing world of coin tossing as we debunk the 50-50 myth. Alongside unveiling the science and strategies behind a successful coin toss, we'll also address the variables involved, from the force used to flip the coin to the surface it lands on. Whether you're looking to decide a friendly dispute, or want to dip your toes in the realm of odds and probabilities, this episode promises fascinating insights into the perfectly balanced world of flipping a coin.
Stepping away from the orderly precision of coin flipping, we delve into the chaotic and controversial world of Catalan's creation: a banana duct-taped to a wall. We'll not only explore what makes this piece art but question its value, its message, and Catalan's nonchalant attitude towards its consumption. As we navigate this unusual artwork, we challenge you to rethink your definition of art and question the role of museums in driving prices for such pieces.
Art, as they say, should feed the soul. But when it literally involves food, the line becomes blurry. We'll wrap up this episode with a thought-provoking discussion on the implications of using food in art, especially against the backdrop of world hunger. What does it mean to spend exorbitant amounts on perishable artworks while millions starve? Let's examine this through the lens of Catalan's piece the "Comedian". So switch on your curiosity and tune in as we transition from probability theory to modern art criticism in one single episode - you won't want to miss it!
https://www.wikihow.com/Flip-a-Coin
https://daily.jstor.org/statistics-of-coin-tosses-theater-geeks/
https://allthatsinteresting.com/maurizio-cattelan-banana-eaten
Today on the Idiots Guide, an age-old question going back beyond a millennia how can I guarantee a win in a coin toss? And when we're hungry, it usually is time to find a snack, but what should you do if that snack was worth $120,000 before you ate it? I'm your host, adam Richardson, aka the Profit Hacker, and I'm joined by the man in charge, mr Joe Haslam. Welcome to the Idiots Guide. Okay, so one of the things that I'm just going to kind of jump right into this, because I think that it's important to clarify this you had mentioned before we started that you've got some statistics that I think we're going to clash on, which is really good. I'm glad, I'm excited about this. But you know, I mean I'm going to say that where I'm getting some of my sources are like the intellectually curious websites, that kind of stuff. So we'll see, we'll see.
Speaker 1:But I think one of those things that's really cool about the coin toss is how I guess how impartial it can feel when you come down to a decision maker. Now, you know there's life and death decisions, there's, you know, all sorts of different decisions that you know. If it comes down to a coin toss, you can. You can really I mean kind of statistically really, totally, kind of mostly a little count on that being a fair, impartial judgment or decision maker. Now, the problem with it is that where I found the issue is not necessarily in the toss, it's in the rules of the toss, because if it's you know, I mean, and we can, we can elaborate a little bit more.
Speaker 1:What about, if it's you know, how did you flip it? Who flips it? Is there a third party that's a mediator in this middle? You have a flipper that's designated, you know, or is one of those people in that party? Did they not flip it aggressive enough? How many turns, rotations in the air does it have to do? Do you catch it with your hand? Do you let it hit the ground? Do you flip it? Once you catch it in your hand, put it in your other hand and that's the result. Those are all sorts of different things that you absolutely have to iron out, otherwise you will have another coin toss to determine the coin toss. Well, it's.
Speaker 2:You know there's, there's really a lot less and a lot more than what you're talking about here. So they have. This is an interesting thing, Okay, so when you look at it mathematically, okay, so you're looking at two different things here. Okay, what are the chances that you will get a heads or a tails on a coin? Toss, I mean versus say it's 50, 50.
Speaker 2:It is. Yeah, you have a 50 50 chance of getting a heads or tails. However, those are not the odds of getting a heads or tails on a coin toss, and that's the variables that you're talking about. So, and even when you talk about, and the reason, mathematically, the chance of getting a heads or tails is because your results are two, you have two results. You're going to get one of those two results. That's a 50 50 chance. Okay, so, but the problem is that's not really what happens.
Speaker 2:And so they, in order to study this, they have actually built coin tossing machines where it gives a consistent flip, it gives a consistent rate of speed, power, how it flips. Every single time it is the exact same. And what are the odds of getting a different result with every time you flip that coin? So if you put it on there, it flips it, you get a heads. What are the odds that you're going to get a tails on the next one? On a coin flipping machine that gives a consistent rate every time? I don't know. Zero. A coin flip machine will give you the exact same result every single time.
Speaker 1:So that's not fair, then, because what we're talking about is the decision, like I can manufacture a machine that gives the exact amount of pressure, put it in the exact same space or line it up perfectly, even down to the kind of coin. It is because that comes into a factor of how it is. Then, when that pressure flips and that coin flips up in the air, it does a perfect amount of rotations every single time. You're right. I would say, if you engineer it down to the degree of pressure, of the physics that a machine can actually produce and you can, basically you've perfected those physics to the exact degree you would eliminate the odds.
Speaker 2:Right, and that's exactly it. That's how simple it is. It's not a chance, it's not an odds. You are going to get the same result every single time, if it is flipped perfectly, every single time.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:And so you flip to the other side of that and you talk about the more complex side of it.
Speaker 1:Well, if you change, Say we're going to talk about the other side of the coin, Jeff.
Speaker 2:Yes, I did.
Speaker 1:I like that.
Speaker 2:If you flip to the other side, you look at the more complex variables here, and so you're looking at what changes, and really everything changes with a coin toss. And so a coin toss isn't just a coin toss. A coin toss is a series of very complex variables, so it's not just a 50-50 chance or 50-50 odds of getting a heads or tails. It all depends on the variables that go into it. That can all be changed and affected to produce a different result, and so it is a lot more. So it's very simple in that if you build a system that does the exact same every time, you're going to get the very same results. But then the real world if you've got a person flipping that coin, they're in control of the variables.
Speaker 1:Well, I have some of those numbers. We'll talk about them here in a minute. What really motivated this for me was Tom Stoppards has a play that he wrote called Rosencrats and Guildenstern are dead, basically right at the very beginning. It's Elizabethan era. So they're playing with a coin and they've got these propped money bags, like bags of money, and they're flipping a coin to find out basically who will essentially win this. And what it is is the kind of like, let's say, it's during production of Shakespeare's Hamlet, by betting on coin tosses.
Speaker 1:So this was kind of the standard back then, betting on this as kind of a form of gambling. Well, what happened in this was flipping the coin in the play. Obviously this is a play, so it's not real life, but it's inspired this curiosity about this it's 92 times in a row it landed heads, heads, heads, again, heads, again heads, and so it's just this kind of like oh, this is unbelievable. And then the comment comes in that says, like you should I can't remember what it says. It says something like a weaker man might be moved to reexamine his faith, if in nothing else, at least in the law of probability. So basically saying, like this dude should take up gambling with those kind of odds because you're winning every single flip, virtually impossible, like the ability for that to happen not machine driven. Is four quad? Quad? I think it's. No, it's four octillion, one in or sorry, one in five octillions is how many that that's the odds of that happening.
Speaker 1:That's the odds of that happening, which means in the United States you can get struck by lightning in the same year four times and you'd have better odds having that happen to you than this happening to you. So the reality is it's just not real. It's not a realistic scenario, but it inspired people to be like okay, well, you have lots of characters now that are based on this coin flip. You know, and everybody you have the infamous, you know the stories of, like the old Westerns or something like that, where they're like let's bring out the coin and it's the trusty trick coin that always lands the same. Why? Cause it's weighted on one side. You know, whatever it is. Now, there's also all sorts of different reasons why different coins. Even, let's say, our American quarter is weighted differently. So I happen to have a trusty bag of heroines and I don't know. I think to keep up the.
Speaker 2:So reality is that you know, let's say, for example, this is our finance version of a podcast for this month.
Speaker 1:Some of these coins. I mean, they have different pictures on the back of them. One I see here has a horse and a barn for Kentucky. The other one has a it looks like a loon in Cumberland Island, 2018. So, either way, depending on the weight of the other side, this would obviously be, you know, george Washington's head, and that head, or what do you call it bust. Is that a bust? Is that what it is? So, his bust and that's heads, obviously. But then the other side, whatever is on the other side, is tails. Okay, what'd you get?
Speaker 2:I got heads.
Speaker 1:Oh, heads all right.
Speaker 2:Ooh, I got heads again. Ooh, oh, I got tails that time. For those of you watching the video version of this, you'll see I'm not flipping it very well, except for that first one.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we'll also talk a little bit more about proper flipping. That way, you know, people who want to challenge this or try this at home, they have the ability to do that, because well, they can. The problem with having a giant pile of change loose in front of me is I have OCD, I'm a fidgeter and I can't not touch all of the things and stack them into pretty neat. I'm going to get lost in counting. I'll be like what number am I at? I can't remember.
Speaker 2:We probably should have thought about this before putting a whole bunch of coins out.
Speaker 2:So, but yeah, it's. I mean, when you talk about you know the odds, when you talk about probability, there's one principle called the. I think it's the rule of large numbers. I may, I know it's of large numbers. I can't remember what the first word is. I think it's the rule of large numbers. And the principle behind the rule of large numbers is that, when you have enough data, that you will have a fair split, and so it may, in the short term, show a weight toward one result or another, but over enough time, with enough data or with enough results, you're going to have a fair result.
Speaker 1:What do you think is enough?
Speaker 2:Well, that's just it. I mean there's, it could be a small number, it could be a large number, it could be. There's no definition of enough. I guess it's a reverse Enough is when it actually shows the correct or the expected pattern.
Speaker 1:There's a mathematician. Jacob Bernoulli talks about the probabilities. To try to work this, he's a Swiss 17th century mathematician. Yep, that's the 1600s, for those listening.
Speaker 2:Maybe it's the law of large numbers. I don't know if it's a law, though.
Speaker 1:And honestly like, just talks about how, like, even in the sense of having a two-headed coin, that's one way of winning. Having a weighted coin, that's another way of winning. Having a coin that's not balanced as far as its weight, typically, even going back to the Roman Empire, they had a stamped coin or a coin stamp that they were using in order for that to be, you know, somewhat in balance, so you weren't having this weird weight dilemma happening with it. It talks about how Caesar, julius Caesar was known for this is a legend, not like it but was known for dealing with some of the legal disputes by flipping a coin. I'm like, how terrible would that be.
Speaker 1:You're like hey, hey, you know what? Let's let fate decide.
Speaker 2:You're like oh no, it's not even fate.
Speaker 1:It isn't fate, it's just. It's the most logical conclusion to an illogical, impartial.
Speaker 2:Well, it's not even that the flipper of the coin can control the results.
Speaker 1:I only counted two flips. It needs at least eight.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, and that's it. I mean, you need one of the good examples of that is the bell curve, and so they use the game Plinko to show an example of that, and so the Plinko is. I think it was from the Price's Right, where it originated. They drop it and it ding, ding, ding, ding it's the triangle and it has evenly spaced dowels that come out, and so when you drop it in, where is it going to land?
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And so probability states that it should have a very even bell distribution. So it's you know, everyone knows, what the bell curve looks like of each of the slots at the bottom, at the bottom of the triangle, and so at first it may be leading toward one side or another, but eventually, with enough of those items being put into the Plinko board, you will get an even distribution is the idea.
Speaker 1:One of the first ones in 18th century. His name was a George-Louis Leclerc or Leclerce Leclerc Leclerc, yes, are you and your mathematicians that you know?
Speaker 2:Well, no, it's a French name.
Speaker 1:You're right. My ancestors are French so, so, count de beufon, I gotta do the nasal thing because I failed math or I failed French in ninth grade halfway through the year and I quit. I started doing Spanish.
Speaker 2:One of the tricks that I was taught to with French is it is very nasally. Yeah, that's exact, french is a very nasally language.
Speaker 1:You know, the reason why I failed is because I couldn't stay awake in the class. The teacher was too boring. That was literally it.
Speaker 2:So it's French. How could it?
Speaker 1:be boring. I learned one thing, and it's je suis zanananan. It means I am a pineapple. You'd think it says I'm a banana, but no, it's, I am a pineapple.
Speaker 2:Well, there you go.
Speaker 1:And it's a little pineapple like Sesame Street version thing that was terrible for a ninth grader to watch and that's the reason why I fell asleep and failed the class.
Speaker 1:Anyway, back to the story. Tossed coins, this mathematician. He tossed a coin for 4,040 times and resulted in 2,048 heads, or a very close half the throws. Now it says basically like a frequency I think this is I wouldn't even know how to say this but relative frequency of.5069. I don't even know how to say this. Do you know how to say that? The squiggly 5069. I don't even know what that is Approximately. Approximately okay, so it's because it's not.
Speaker 2:I think it only gave you six decimal places.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and so there's actually a lot more decimal places. So you put the squiggly because it's not the actual number, it's approximately.
Speaker 1:I'm assuming like approximately, like he's taking a coin and doing this and then approximately the time it's taken him to do that right there, relative frequency right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, no, no, no, no. So relative frequency. What it's saying is how often it's going to show up. So the heads will show up at 50.6% of the time approximately, but it's actually 50.689 or probably 50.687215% of the time 333333. Exactly, and so that's why it's approximate is because it shortens it down to when you're dealing with statistics and probability and all these numbers. You want to be as accurate as possible, so you make sure you put the approximate when you decrease the total number of decimal places.
Speaker 1:Well, honestly, the mathematician Carl Pearson, from England he was English Pearson, I don't know, I guess is that Pearson, I don't know whatever.
Speaker 2:Can you tell that we have ADHD problems today?
Speaker 1:He, he was like 4,000. That's not enough. We need more quantifiable data. I'm going to do this 24,000 times. Nice, like, how, like I hope you like. Paste yourself like today I'm going to do this many flips Tomorrow I will do this. I don't think you can sit through 24,000 flips, but if that was, you would be in the Guinness Book of World Records. He's going to start.
Speaker 2:So you could do about one, flip a second Three. So that's, let's see. So in one minute you're going to do 60. In an hour You're going to do what is that? 2400 or no? 3600 in an hour. So in 10 hours you can do 36,000. Man, I mean no breaks so so he would only have to do that. That's 10 hours 36. That's two thirds of that. So you're talking about six, seven hours of flipping coins. It's really not that bad.
Speaker 1:Okay. So anyway, 12,012 in the throws coming up as heads, relative to the frequency is, was about 50.05 approximately, so even closer to those 50, 50 odds. So it was one of those things was just like look, these guys from you know, a couple hundred years ago, a few hundred years ago, went and had tried this and determined like, hey, I'm going to, I'm going to keep like this isn't, this isn't doing anything different. Every single time I do this, no matter how many times I do it, it's coming out roughly close to 50. So, yeah, then we get these machines in our modern society and they can do it down to the exact degree of pressure and, yeah, guaranteed. So the other thing that's that's kind of an interesting thing is I learned that Democrats and this is not a political statement, it's just a observation that Democrats in history have actually a long history of deciding things via coin toss. I'm not going to go political on that.
Speaker 2:Democrats have not always been the Democrats they are today. So historically, Republicans were the liberal progressive party and Democrats were the ultra conservative party. It just it changes as ideology changes. But that's interesting that even though ideologies change, the structures that they follow tend to stay the same, in that Democratic party versus the Republican party. That's interesting.
Speaker 1:It's really interesting to see if it's something that they have like in their like determination, like in their law they're like Robert's rules kind of thing. It could be in their coin. Toss, if you cannot get over this, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it could be in there, because every organization like that has to have bylaws, and so it could be written in their bylaws, which is why it's more prevalent.
Speaker 1:You know one of the things I think that makes coin tosses like it was a kid's game back years and years ago and it still is to this day. It's still always this weird. You know, impartial, determinant in whatever you have as far as a disagreement, you know, or to find an agreement to come to a conclusion, to figure out which direction you're going to go, whatever you want, like life or death. You know you have what's his name? Harvey Dent from Batman. You know he had the two headed coin. One had a scratch on it, the other side didn't, and he'd always flip that to determine people's fate. You know there's a scene in no Country for Old Men that they do that. They determine that the other one is, you know.
Speaker 1:Just talking about the simplicity of the rules, you know, like I said oftentimes, though I mentioned a couple of the complexities about before you flip a coin, it's the simplest rule game as far as gambling. It has odds are most likely 50-50, and then you have this. You know, if you look at like a roulette wheel or like to throw the dice, how you have to do that. Or you know any other, like even poker, trying to try to negotiate the odds of playing. You know, let's play Blackjack and any of those where you're trying to trying to mathematically look at the cards, you still have a statistical odd against you that that's going to play. Play into how you play, not in Blackjack. Okay, all right. See, the Joe is kicked out of Wendover.
Speaker 2:I've never actually counted cards in Vegas. I know how to, but I never have.
Speaker 1:Just don't get caught, okay.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's the problem, I'm not caught.
Speaker 1:You'll swim with the fishes. You know, I don't know. Like I don't count cards, so I'm actually really good at Blackjack, though that's one of those things that has led us on another rabbit trail.
Speaker 2:Well, and this is the thing when we talk about the odds, when we talk about the chances, when we talk about anything in life where we're looking at I'm going to flip a coin for this, play Blackjack it's where you know you're looking at the odds. You're going to gamble at a casino. The odds are never what they seem.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And and I think that's the biggest takeaway is that you know, realistically we think that that's the case, but in reality it's not. You know, we think flipping a coin is going to give us a fair chance of either option, and the reality is it won't. You'd have to flip 24,000 coins in order to do that. But even if you do that many, if, depending on if you are the person flipping the coin, if someone else is flipping the coin, you can if you want the coin to flip in the way that you want. I've actually done a study on this. Canadians gotta love.
Speaker 2:The Canadians did an actual study flipping coins and the focus of the study was not the impartiality of flipping coins but to see whether, if you wanted to wait it in your corner, if you could. And so it was a small study 13 participants, 300 coin flips each, and they were incentivized. They were given, you know, a week to prepare, to learn how to flip coins to their advantage, and they were incentivized. The two top people who got the biggest disparity between heads and tails would win a prize. And so there's. This is the exact fundamentals that we have when we have two people competing for a coin. Toss is that there is a legitimate value to winning, and so you want to win. So if you're the one tossing the coin, you're going to want to flip it so that it lands on your choice, and so it was a really well done study to see if you can manipulate it, and what they found is that there were people that were able to get a huge disparity between heads and tails. I think the largest disparity was a 67% frequency of heads.
Speaker 1:You know, one of the things that that is like, according to this podcast, that we're talking about today is how to guarantee a win, right? So how you guarantee a win is exactly what you're talking about. So one of the things that's recommended and this is I got, I got this information from WikiHow, so you know it's probably the most reliable source of information out there, but it made sense. So I was like, neat, we're going with it, so I'll, I'll, I'll source it, I'll put the link in there and are in the in the notes, but the the statistics. Basically what it's talking about is, you know, in coin flipping, depending on which side you hold the coin, on what, what do you started on? Do you started heads up or do you start it with the tails up? And then you know.
Speaker 1:One of the other things is coins. I mentioned to you that newer coins have a little bit more, honestly, a little bit more of a design on it. I don't think necessarily. Actually it's a weight thing, because I in numismatics, like the weight is actually weighed out before, that's that anything is put into the coin, so the weight of the metal never changes. However, how that is situated, let's say I've got a weird wonky picture with a horse over in the corner and you know that for some reason, is able to throw it off. Honestly, if you're betting on those odds, it's not going to work in your favor, but well, most, most things.
Speaker 2:I mean the weight is pretty well centralized in coins. Yeah, it's, it's not. There's not anything that's going to be significantly weighing it out. So I, I, I agree with you. I don't think it's the you know, if there's a different design on the front versus the back, I think it's negligible if it's going to impact it at all.
Speaker 1:I think you know more of the. The encouragement behind that is to get into this mindset of determining what kind of coin you want. You know, the idea would be that if I get a coin from the 80s it's going to have gone through. I don't know where it's been. So first off I don't want to touch it.
Speaker 2:But second one side maybe Uh uh, worn down more than the other like shoes.
Speaker 1:Somebody decided to color with it on the concrete. You know it's there's. There's so many different things. The edges are all worn off of of of the edge of it. It's gone through too many thousand you know coin slot machines to be able to be any worth anything at all. So a newer coin, you're going to have something that you have the ridges, you have the edges, you can feel all those different edges that are around it. You have that. It's a. I'm dropping money as I'm going here. But, um, you know you want to pursue a coin that's newer because then you have less of a chance of an imbalance, even in the sense that you said that weight is really negligible in the end result. But if you're looking for one singular instant where you have a control of that variable, these are some things to consider.
Speaker 2:Yeah, if you're the one tossing the coin, and and this is the thing if you're tossing a coin to decide between option A or option B, there may be some subconscious part of you that wants it to fall on one or the other and, subconsciously, the force that you put into flipping that coin, without even thinking about it, will produce that result. Because your brain recognizes patterns, it follows patterns, and it's been doing this from the day you, from before you were born, and so it's looking for all of these patterns, all these situations, and so when you get that coin out, you're going to be inherently your brain will do this completely subconsciously, not consciously or actively. It will know what to do in order to get that result.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:The way that you put it in your hand, the way that you which side you put up first. Without even knowing it, it's going to potentially do that. So even when you're, when you're challenging against yourself for that coin, toss it's, there could be something that's already weighted to that direction.
Speaker 1:The suggestion is is to get familiar with a coin, like feel it in your hands without looking at it, know that, hey, this, this side is definitely George Washington, this side is not, you know, or whatever coin. If if a quarter's too big and you have really tiny hands, then try a smaller coin. If you feel like a quarter's too small, try a bigger coin. I've got there's not very many bigger coins in that, but Well, in Saka, julia dollar. Okay, guys, come on.
Speaker 2:And I think the bigger point with all this is we're talking about how to win a coin toss. Yes, okay. So why do you want to win a coin toss? You want to win.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And you can use this same idea with anything that you do. How do you win in life? Now, there's a lot of random chance that happens in life. Just the same as I could flip this coin and there could be a massive gust of wind that comes across that changes the rotation of that coin and now something else happens. But you know the the amount of force that I put on the coin. There are a lot of variables that go into it, but the same happens with life. And so you look at how do I win in life? And the biggest thing is learn the variables. Yeah, education, and that can come from going to college, that can be from the school of hard knocks, but getting that education, getting that knowledge, is what's gonna help you to Overcome.
Speaker 1:Those are the randomness of the variables but just like picking the petals off of a flower, he loves me. He loves me. Not flipping a coin for your decisions is really not the strongest decision-making.
Speaker 2:No, I mean, and and that's the thing I mean in life a lot of times, who buys the beer do?
Speaker 1:it.
Speaker 2:Yes, you know Just make sure you have control of that coin Exactly, and you've practiced with that coin so that when the coin flip happens you have a 2-thirds chance of it landing on the one you want. So you don't have to pay for it.
Speaker 1:So in in wiki how it gives you an instruction and I'm gonna try to Verbally explain this so you can understand. This is basically form your hand into a little fist, ball it into a fist. So those who would be watching the video, they can see my hand in a little fist and then you take your thumb and you tuck it underneath your index finger. So it's kind of tucked there. You don't put the coin on there yet. Joe, come on. Well, fine, okay, there. So I I tend to be very uncomfortable with a full fist. I feel like I'm gonna fling this thing to the ceiling if.
Speaker 1:I do that so. So I usually have a little bit more of an open hand. But basically the idea or the concept behind it is taking a quarter or coin and Putting it on your index finger just above where your thumb is tucked underneath it. If that means that your fist is completely closed, then everybody watch out. If that means that you have a little opening to your fist so that it has the room to be able to fling, then we're golden and Go ahead and you know, I just looked up before throwing this and it is nothing really that breakable.
Speaker 2:I've been watching reruns of mythbusters and one of the early episodes they're testing the penny falling from the Skyscraper. Oh yeah they do the shot and it goes right up into one of the overhead lights and so as I'm looking at, as I'm about to flip the coin, I look up right above where my hand is are the overhead lights. So I think I'm gonna move that a little bit so hopefully I don't hit those. I don't think I have the force for that, but I still don't want to hit it.
Speaker 1:So once it's in that position, it's all about pressure. It is how fast or how, how much pressure do you fling your thumb out of that pocket that it's in? So if I do that, I kind of nudge it with my my like, nudge my arm up a little bit and flip it. So you know, let me do that again and I'm gonna put the heads there up.
Speaker 2:So there's another quarter over there somewhere.
Speaker 1:Pretty good, gentlemen, I'm getting attacked. Right now it's rain in money. Penny's, not so much Penny's yeah, they're a little dainty, so they, I feel like pennies, are the ones that you fling at each other. You know you do that little like snap fling thing.
Speaker 2:I don't know. And today we live up to the name of the podcast.
Speaker 1:I'm just like wincing, waiting for it to hit me in the head like I'm gonna have this. Why is there a mark on your head, honey? Yeah, joe was throwing money at me.
Speaker 2:I'm getting pretty good rotation on that. That is some pretty massive Force going on there off of that technique. I mean, I don't usually do that, I just usually sit it so that my thumb is like halfway.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, like, I know, like this, I'm just yeah, you know, so I don't even tighten my fists like that, like I feel like, if I do that, like I think this is devolved at this point, ladies and gentlemen, we need to stop what we're doing, because we're going to hurt each other.
Speaker 2:This is when I start. Yeah, don't.
Speaker 1:So I think that the mainly I think we've we've concluded on this is it really Do what's comfortable for flinging a coin. Don't fling it at people, don't tighten your fists so much that your thumb comes flying out and flings a quarter across the room. Do it so that you can. You know, practice this, take it and before you go and you're like today I'm going to do a coin toss, I know I'm going to, so I'm going to warm up and I'm gonna have my, my thumb is going to be nice and flexed and ready to go and whatever I don't, yeah, whatever.
Speaker 1:But the point of it is, if you have the control that's probably your best variable for you to have is, if you have the control of flipping or you are the flipper, then you have the most control in that entire scenario. Why? Because if I flip it Harder the next time I flip it, or so on and so forth, a very how hard I fling that, then you know I'm still flipping a coin. That that's not a variable that we're talking about in any of this. And even looking at the mathematicians, I would go to ask that question what kind of pressure are we talking about Every single time? Was it consistent. I'm sure that mathematicians were pretty religious about how much pressure they were giving it.
Speaker 2:Well, and that's part of why the law of large numbers Maybe it is the law of large numbers Goes into this scenario, because you've got so many different variables. So the power that you're putting in, you've got the wind that's coming up, which one you started with? With our heads or tails, where your position is, whether it hits the Carpet, whether it hits a hard floor, all these are different variables. That impacts exactly how your result comes out. And so, because they're going to be different on the power, on every single one of them, because it's going to potentially land differently on the hard surface every time, whether on the end, one side versus the other, all these things come into play. That's where the average Comes out to 50 50, but not each individual flip.
Speaker 2:And so if you are completely random with how much power you're putting into it, if you are completely random with what surface it's going to fall on, and you do 24,000 coin flips, yes, it's going to come out average. But if you control the variables, if you control how it comes through, like if you catch it in your hand, for on the downward angle, there is no chance that it's going to Bounce off and come up a different result. It's going to land in your hand, yeah, and so now you have Controlled some of that variable so that it comes out what you want it to do. And so there are all these different things that if you are in control of variables you really can get much better than 50%. On a coin flip you can get upwards of two-thirds. I mean 66 percent variable of, or 66 percent result of, a heads, if you want heads or tails, if you want tails, that's pretty good.
Speaker 1:The the variables. That I would say is, or the advice that I would say to guarantee a win is control the variables. Now, I can't a hundred percent guarantee that. All I can do is guarantee a win in the sense that if you are controlling the variables and you know even to the sense of, hey, do I get to flip and do I get to call what it is you know, or that kind of stuff if it's between you and I, you know it's.
Speaker 1:It's really really important to iron out the rules of the coin toss. They're really simple, guys, but you can over complicate it if you get too much into it. When do I call it out? Do I call it out mid-air? Do we call it out before you flip it? You know, those things can actually help determine what you do. There's even practice techniques to where, if you're practicing at home, you're watching that coin flip in the air to see how it's flipping, so that you can try To see where to catch it at, so that you're actually training your eye to identify what side of the coin you're catching it on. Now that's not gonna nuts, that's. That's gonna take some time to be able to do. But seriously, if you really want to get that Good at coin and and and you know coin flipping and that it's that some. You want to prove this statistic wrong. First and foremost, you're proving it right anyway, because of how much work you're putting in to try to prove it wrong.
Speaker 2:If all the variables are random, it will come out random with a split 50, 50 or close to it. But you know, and and muscle memory is another one. So you talked about the force that you're able to put into that coin. That is something that you can train your thumb to do. Think about walking and running. We know exactly how much force to get a specific pace. When we're walking somewhere, when we're walking in a crowd, we're not actively thinking I need to slow down all of a sudden because someone's walking in the path that I was going on. You just automatically slow down your pace, pick back up your pace, and all of these things are happening as you're walking.
Speaker 2:I challenge you as you're going around your Christmas shopping over the next couple of weeks, watch your pace as you're at the mall or at the large shopping center, because you're gonna see how that adjusts Automatically without you even thinking about it. And that's what happens, is you learn that muscle memory with flipping the coin. The more muscle memory that you have to get a consistent Amount of force on that coin means that you're going to be able to control when that coin ends up. Yeah, and so again, controlling the variables. The more knowledge. The more training, the more experience that you have, the better the results are going to be in your favor. 100% of the time, no, but a good majority of the time and again. I think that really applies to life. You know how often are we actually working on controlling the variables? We've got inflation. We've got Interest rates going up on home price, on home on.
Speaker 1:Home loans.
Speaker 2:Insecurity in jobs, all these kinds of things that are going on. Well, if you're controlling the variables, if you've got the control about what happens in your life, you're not gonna be able to control whether you get laid off or not, but you can control Whether you're gonna get the next job or not. Yeah and all of that comes down to having the right setup and having the right setup. And I know we're talking about coin flips, but it really is the same thing.
Speaker 1:It really is, you know, if you work out, you know, I guess I guess it's less of taking it and just betting on the chances or betting on the statistics that this is gonna happen for you and your favor. You know, it just doesn't work that way. The more that you have the ability to control variables whether that is getting the right kind of job or whether that is, you know, even down to I guess you know I always like this when I'm driving down the road and I get all the green lights instead of all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 1:I was like man, if I only left 30 seconds earlier I would have made all these lights, you know. And so I don't know. It's just one of those things. Joe, I have a question for you real quick. Okay, what is four times 120,000?
Speaker 2:480,000?
Speaker 1:480,000 quarters. That's how many. That's how much a duct tape banana was A duct tape banana.
Speaker 2:I know, this is a weird transition.
Speaker 1:I totally get it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, not one of your best transitions here. Come on.
Speaker 1:I'm trying to okay, work with me here, okay, okay. So Lee-Yum Museum of Art in Seoul, south Korea. There was a display, maurizio Catalan's piece of art on the wall there and it literally has a banana duct tape to a wall Worth 120,000 dollars.
Speaker 2:Okay, commentary on art here. That's not art. You know you can disagree with me. I love art. I grew up in California. I grew up going to all of the art museums out there. I love art. My wife's an artist and it is. It can be amazing stuff. It can evoke emotional responses. It can contradict the societal norms. It can bring awareness to issues that are going on in the social cultures. But a banana duct tape to a wall is not. It does not evoke emotion. It does not bring any awareness to social injustice. It doesn't do anything except say it's a banana duct tape.
Speaker 1:Do you think that protesters would glue themselves to that duct tape, banana, like in protesting?
Speaker 2:whatever you know, global warming, whatever they do lately, It'd be nice if they did it to that instead of the other really nice artwork Now and I do agree that all artwork is overpriced, but you know it should be available to the masses, it should be a public item, especially since most of the artists never received the money for their artwork in their lifetime.
Speaker 1:So it's no Huyin Huyin so was a student actually. That was there and he was hungry. He skipped breakfast, and so he noticed that there was a banana tape to a wall and he ate the banana.
Speaker 2:And you know, yes, I mean I can see how that's defacing property, I mean that's. But honestly, who would think that a banana duct tape to a wall? My first thought would be that someone's lunch, you know, maybe the security guard is gonna be there later and so he's duct tape it to the walls that he can have.
Speaker 1:This is like in my route, like I'm walking through this area of the banana. I'm gonna keep right here.
Speaker 2:Right, because he knows he's gonna come up there at like 11 o'clock, so he's been working for quite a few hours. Get a potassium boost, cause he's walking and standing on needs that potassium, so that would be. My first thought is that this is maybe a security guard, this is maybe a curator, someone who's put that there as kind of a joke that they just need that later. They don't have a desk where they can go eat their banana, so I wouldn't eat it, but I would never think that it's actually art worth. What is that? A hundred thousand times what it's actually worth A dollar 20 for the banana and the duct tape.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think like if they're not on sale cause bananas go on sale of like 59 cents for.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, I'm an expensive duct tape, you know.
Speaker 1:So I mean you have to have the duct tape last, so that's really super important. But you know what was I think, what was probably even entertaining about this, and maybe this is just a joke in its entirety the name of the piece is called Comedian. Okay, this art student that was visiting the museum taped the banana peel back up under the duct tape so that it was at least still mostly the piece that it was. So, but what was kind of funny about it is like, as they Is this the onion where you got the article?
Speaker 1:No, this is all that is interestingcom. So writer of the piece is let me make sure I give them some street cred here Amber Breeze, and this was actually a few months ago. But the museum? They didn't take any punitive measures against snow, oh good. Instead, they basically just replaced the banana peel with a fresh banana. Apparently, apparently, this the museum, this is the reason.
Speaker 2:Why Is that now considered counterfeit? Is that a fortune? I think it's a copy of the original.
Speaker 1:Typically, the museum has to replace the banana every two to three days anyway, so they didn't press charges. They're like oh man, you screwed up our buying rotation of bananas.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, I mean if there is a banana, is it?
Speaker 1:120,000?.
Speaker 2:Because it's been there 60 cents.
Speaker 1:Has it been there that long that it's worth $120,000 worth of changes?
Speaker 2:You know, growing up my dad taught me the value of something is only what someone is willing to pay for it.
Speaker 1:I thought about this the whole time. I was like who in their right mind is going to pay that kind of money like for a banana? They're gonna have to replace every couple of days, Right, you know? Oh man, I'm making a shake and I don't have any. Look, I have a banana right here 120,000,.
Speaker 2:I mean that's so copyable. I'll go put a banana with duct tape on my wall at my house, call it an artwork and ensure my house for 120,000 more, but your name is not Maurizio. Catalan, I'll change it.
Speaker 1:Okay, I have no idea why that's so special, but that dude is special enough to do something that probably a special student in class would do. So you know, honestly, I don't understand the logic either. It doesn't make any sense to me, but you know, they've been changing that banana since 2019.
Speaker 2:So All right, if you want real artwork, I'm just gonna throw this out. You know, go to the Huntington Library in California. That is real art.
Speaker 1:They actually asked him, maurizio Catalan, about his concern, whether or not he it bothers him that people consume his artwork and he has no problem with it. Oh, oh, oh, oh oh.
Speaker 2:Oh, are you sure this isn't the onion? It's not, it's I. I am literally speechless. Our listener knows that I am never speechless. I am the one that talks forever and I am literally speechless.
Speaker 1:The problem that I see with this is that they, like I, just the type of art that this artist does like I'm reading on and it talks about, like is previous works include America. It's an 18 karat gold toilet value.
Speaker 2:You did over $6 million that there actually is a social idea behind that that you know.
Speaker 1:Sure well we'll have ill Dito middle finger sculpture that sat opposite Milan stock exchange. Okay, I like that one. So his artwork says a statement, I think. I think the point of the comedian is literally to incite this kind of like Shock that you're like why. You know like it's. It's meant to be consumed, it's meant to have some brave idiot walk up and say you know what I'll eat? A banana's tape to a wall. That's fine with me and and that's part of the artwork in and of itself that continues to thrive Because this piece was viewed at another one, like it was in another part of the part of the world, and a comedian went by and an actual comedian went up and ate the banana.
Speaker 2:So you know, but the waste of food. I mean you have to replace the banana. I mean hopefully someone's eating that banana when they're replacing it. I don't know that I would want to, with how many people may be touching it, but I mean such a waste of food.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I.
Speaker 2:What is that? So if they're replacing it every two days, that's three bananas a week. That's a lot of bananas when you talk about it's up there for maybe a year.
Speaker 1:And it's been in rotation since 2019. I mean, you're talking.
Speaker 2:The amount of food almost a thousand bananas. The amount of food that have been consumed. Yeah well, I mean it goes against. You know, the what I would see as a social movement. I mean, look at how many starving kids there are and you're putting a banana on a wall. I mean, come on, do something real, Bring focus to the lack of like the other ones nutrition.
Speaker 2:Right, you know, those actually have purpose. People may think they're funny and stupid and whatever, but they actually do evoke a response. This, I just this is frustrating to me. It's, it's, it's not funny at all, it's not a comedian, I'm not laughing, I'm not laughing at.
Speaker 1:I'm laughing, I'm not laughing. All right, so before Joe blows a gasket, we're gonna, we're gonna get get this all said and done. Hey guys, honestly, if you see a banana taped to a wall, just good rule of thumb, don't eat it. You know the variables are not there and they're not going to be in your favor. Usually you might, by chance, run across this one opportunity where it is, but at the same time, you should probably just condemn it and say that that's really inappropriate use of food when we have starving children in Ethiopia. You know so Well.
Speaker 2:I shouldn't I should have children in the United States.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we do have starving children down the street, so so I think I think the point of this is to, just like the solid gold toilet, it's to to point out the tremendous amount of useless waste that could be used elsewhere. Yeah, and maybe that's the message that he's sending, is that this is, you know, I don't understand why, you know wasting that kind of a banana. You know, I mean, you're, I mean you're still talking $1,000 over the last you know, four years of that being on display. So, yeah, maybe it's time to question that kind of artwork and stick to sculptures, mauricio, please. There you go. Anyway, we have reached the end of our show for today.
Speaker 2:I have agitated and it's time for us to run veins are popping.
Speaker 1:Hey guys, life's too short, so keep laughing and keep learning and remember idiots have way more fun.