20/06/2023
In 22 trials, Small and Tse predicted the correct half 13 times. Overall that would have earned them 18 percent profit on a theoretical stake, they report.
"It is clear that in principle one should be able to make some predictions, given sufficient information," said Holger Dullin of the University of Sydney in Australia. "The paper by Small and Tse did a good analysis."
The concept of using scientific understanding to beat the house isn’t new. In the late 1970s the "Eudaemons," a group of physics postgraduates, used theoretical insights and a rudimentary computer concealed in a shoe to win at roulette in Nevada in the 1970s. But since they didn’t publish their research, nobody outside their team knows the details of how they did it.
On the heels of this new research, however, J. Doyne Farmer, a group member who is now a professor of mathematics at Oxford, has written a report on the exploit that he plans to submit for publication.
"Small and Tse get some aspects of roulette prediction right," Farmer said. "I can’t say whether their system would work, but I'm sure it is not as good as ours."
