Heads Or Tails?
What can we learn about happiness when people make key life decisions based on a coin toss? And we look into the birthday paradox using the World Cup's ideal data-set.
Freakonomics guru Steven Levitt joins us to talk about an unusual experiment – getting people to agree to make major life decisions based on the toss of a coin. Is this really good social science? And what do the results tell us about decision making and happiness?
With 365 days in the year, it feels like a huge coincidence when we meet someone with the same birthday. But you only need 23 people to have a better than even chance that two will share a birthday. This counter-intuitive result is known as the birthday paradox, and the best place to look for proof is the World Cup, where 32 squads of 23 players provide an ideal data-set. Alex Bellos crunches the numbers for us.
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Read James Fletcher’s article for the 91¸£ÀûÉç News Magazine website.
Broadcasts
- Fri 13 Jun 2014 18:50GMT91¸£ÀûÉç World Service Online
- Sun 15 Jun 2014 22:50GMT91¸£ÀûÉç World Service Online
- Mon 16 Jun 2014 01:50GMT91¸£ÀûÉç World Service Online
- Mon 16 Jun 2014 08:50GMT91¸£ÀûÉç World Service Online
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When can you trust statistics?
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Tim Harford explains the numbers and statistics used in everyday life

