RE: Unfair Coin Flip
September 29, 2017 at 5:11 pm
(This post was last modified: September 29, 2017 at 5:34 pm by Alex K.)
(September 29, 2017 at 11:57 am)Tiberius Wrote: Suppose you have a coin, and you suspect it is unfair (i.e. it lands on one side more often than the other). You don't know which side it lands on more, and for sake of argument assume you can't find out.
How can you simulate a fair coin flip using this coin only? By "fair" I mean that you should get a "heads" result exactly 50% of the time, and a "tails" result exactly 50% of the time.
Invert the result of every other flip?
Probably too easy - it depends on what you want to accomplish. It'll give you exactly 50:50, but with strong correlation between subsequent flips if the coin is unfair.
The fool hath said in his heart, There is a God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good.
Psalm 14, KJV revised edition
