Dolores Macnamara won 77 million pounds on the Euromillions lottery.

Monday, 28. March 2011

For the South African National lottery the probability of winning the jackpot is about 1 in 14 million (Endnote 10). But God never instructs us to follow this example. The expected value is -50. It gives a greater percentage to sport and recreation than it does to reconstruction and development. It takes a few minutes to lose 1000 simulated bucks. A Las Vegas casino owner candidly put it this way, “When we put 50 machines in, I consider them 50 more mousetraps . For the casino, the slot machine is a supremely effective way to get money. Download my freeware lottery simulator called Lotto Nonsense? According to the National Safety Council, an American getting killed by lightening in a given year is more likely (about 1 chance in 6 million) (Endnote 11). Why don’t casinos design quick slot machines like my simulator? The researchers suggest a better way of pursuing excitement – find something to live for. Does this match your priorities? The former showed dramatic increases in aggravated assaults, rapes, robberies and other crimes (Endnote 18). Think of it as the long run average (Endnote 1). To pray to win the lottery is to pray that others will lose. One question to ask of a cause is whether and by how much the good outweighs the bad. They are like the soldiers who crucified Jesus – looking down at the lots they cast for His clothes instead of up at Him dying for them (Endnote 30). I do not remember the bets. Consider national lotteries. You do not have to wait a quarter of a million years to see the big picture. It is not enough to point out that they create millionaires and give to charity. In real lotteries, you get the same bad expected value ((Endnote 8). “Just as man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment… According to the National Lotteries Board website, for the current seven year license an average of only 30 percent of lottery ticket sales will be contributed to good causes (Endnote 27). I think it was at a church fete. A person playing Lotto every week can only expect to win the jackpot about once every quarter of a million years. Scripture says, “The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the LORD” (Endnote 20). Being attracted to light works for moths on moonlit nights, but became suicidal after the invention of the candle. In fact, as bad as one-arm-bandits are, they have a far better expected value than state lotteries. Imagine a lottery that sells only four tickets at one buck each. You could do far worse than lose money from gambling – you could forfeit your soul. One study found that pathological gamblers are three times more likely to have been incarcerated than non-gamblers (Endnote 17). The reason for my little bit of success at gambling has little to do with skill or luck. Many people do not see the big picture. Biologists suspect that our propensity to gamble may be because has some adaptive value in a variable, natural environment (Endnote 23). I recall hearing about a novel social programme. Death threats and kidnap plots have forced her and her children into hiding. They distribute the pain over time and we feel it less acutely. The trouble with gambling is that it denies the gospel. I began with coins and ended with notes. On average a person can expected to receive (0.25 X 4) = 50c for every buck spent. The person with the winning ticket gets two bucks (the payoff). His example reveals a deep and inspiring truth. It is big on promise, but small on delivery. Let us apply this criterion to the Lotto. Remember that Jesus died so that all your sins could be forgiven. This is not a very efficient way of giving. Instead of pressing a button countless times, just one key press gets the computer to do thousands of bets per minute. It enables you to compare spending your money on a lotto ticket or putting it into an interest-bearing savings account instead. They took felons and trained them in dangerous search and rescue operations. Another Las Vegas owner said, “If you wanna make money in a casino, own one” (Endnote 4).