Bercow for Prime Minister?

@kevcvs57 said
I don’t know, you choose, your the victim here.

That’s very slippery of you

@hells-caretaker said
@kevcvs57

Typical liberal rant...

Yeah I think your meant to quote which liberal rant your referring to, I’ve done a few, unless you misspelled ‘rat’ in which case cheers you’ve put me ahead of divegeester on points.

@divegeester said
That’s very slippery of you

There’s a lot of it about

@wolfgang59 said
What odds would you suggest are fair?

I am not a bookmaker, and so guessing the true odds of John Bercow becoming the next Prime Minister would be taking a stab in the dark (although I think that it's a highly unlikely outcome), but that's beside the point. What I think counts as "fair odds" in this case is mostly irrelevant to my choice about whether to wager on it (I would not). If a bookmaker offers "fair odds" on a certain outcome, it means that these odds perfectly reflect the true probability of this event taking place, giving an expected value of 0. Often, a bookmaker offering fair odds or even odds that are significantly longer than fair is not enough to make the gamble "reasonable" (to use your word) in the eyes of most people. I'll illustrate this using some examples:

The only circumstance where it's remotely rational to use a bookmaker to wager is if you believe that the true odds of an event taking place are shorter than the odds that the bookmaker is offering. Of course, betting when the true odds are longer makes no sense unless you derive pleasure from losing money.

Let's be generous to you and say that you know for a fact that the bookmaker's odds are far too long and that the true odds of John Bercow becoming the next Prime Minister are 15/1 as opposed to 33/1. Let's say you decide to wager £100 on this.

The expected value of the gamble is 0.0625 x 3300 - 0.9375 x 100 = £112.5. Given that this is positive (and significantly so) it seems "reasonable" to take the gamble. But the problem is that a positive expected value alone isn't enough. I'll illustrate this with another example:

You are offered 3 gambles:

Gamble 1:
You toss a coin. If heads, you win £1000. If tails, you lose £5. The expected value is £497.5. The winning outcome is 200 times larger than the losing outcome, the losing outcome is a small loss and the odds are 1/1. It is an easy choice to take this gamble.

Gamble 2:
If heads, you win £2000, and if tails, you lose £1000. The expected value is £500, slightly more than the first, but this time, the winning outcome is only twice as large as the losing outcome, the losing outcome is unpleasant and the odds are the same, 1/1. Although the expected value is slightly higher for this gamble is higher than the one for gamble 1, this gamble is a far less attractive gamble to the overwhelming majority of people.

Gamble 3:
If heads, you win £100000, and if tails, you lose £50000. The expected value is £25000. The expected value is many times more than either the first or second gamble and the odds are the same and the winning value is in the same proportion to the losing value as in gamble 2, but there is a 50% chance that you face the ruinous outcome of losing £50000. Although the expected value is far higher, very few people would take this gamble.

Now, back to our example and why what I think counts as "fair odds" in this example is largely irrelevant to my decision not to wager on it. There's only one trial for the event "John Bercow becomes the next Prime Minister", so even if I know for a fact that the true odds are 15/1 and not 33/1 (an extremely generous assumption), which implies a large expected value for my bet of £100, there's still a 93.75% chance that I lose my stake. For nearly everyone, the high expected value is not enough to offset this potential loss in their eyes. The gamble would become progressively more attractive the more trials there were if there were more than one.

My overall point is that the extreme unlikelihood of this outcome occurring makes it a very unattractive gamble, even if one thinks that the bookmaker is hideously wrong and the "fair odds" are much shorter. The adjustment from the bookmaker's odds to almost any reasonable supposition about the "fair odds" is not enough due to the low starting point. This is why I would need "insider information" to consider this gamble.

@divegeester said
I’ll add “slippery” to the list of unpleasant adjectives thrown at me then. As I have said many times in this forum, I am a floating voter. I’ve voted Labour multiple times, LibDem once, Conservative multiple times and UKIP multiple times.
In future I will vote Brexit Party every single time until Brexit is done or the party dissolves.

The brexit party will exist for 2 years, max.
Even if brexit is cancelled.
Farage will move ever forth and then there’s nothing left.

@shavixmir said
Even if brexit is cancelled.

😵

@ashiitaka said
I am not a bookmaker, and so guessing the true odds of John Bercow becoming the next Prime Minister would be taking a stab in the dark (although I think that it's a highly unlikely outcome), but that's beside the point. What I think counts as "fair odds" in this case is mostly irrelevant to my choice about whether to wager on it (I would not). If a bookmaker offers "fair od ...[text shortened]... e to the low starting point. This is why I would need "insider information" to consider this gamble.

Applause.

@ashiitaka said
I am not a bookmaker,

"Don't know" would have sufficed and saved you some time.

@hells-caretaker said
Maybe Farage is a better option than Bercow?

Of course!

@wolfgang59 said
"Don't know" would have sufficed and saved you some time.

I already explained to you why my estimation of the "fair odds" is not worth reading due to the fact that I'm not a bookmaker and why I also regard the true odds as being largely irrelevant in this particular scenario. My post to you was a polite way of informing you that I regard your question as irrelevant.

Given that A) the bookmakers are trying to make a profit, meaning that their displayed odds are likely already shorter than their estimation of the true probability of the event occurring and B) the already low implied probability of the event occurring (0.0294), you would have to know something extraordinary about the machinations of British politicians that the bookmakers who follow this all day do not in order to be sure that your wager is "reasonable" and not an almost surefire way to lose money.

@wolfgang59 said
"Don't know" would have sufficed and saved you some time.

Do you still adamantly maintain that in the next General Election the Brexit Party will not gain a single seat?

@divegeester said
Do you still adamantly maintain that in the next General Election the Brexit Party will not gain a single seat?

I hate clichés ... but you are a broken record.

btw: how many seats do you think they will get without an electoral pact?

@wolfgang59 said
I hate clichés ... but you are a broken record.

btw: how many seats do you think they will get without an electoral pact?

C'mon dive ... answer the question!