You're looking at Less Wrong's discussion board. This includes all posts, including those that haven't been promoted to the front page yet. For more information, see About Less Wrong.

ScottL comments on What Exactly Do We Mean By "Rationality"? - Less Wrong Discussion

4 Post author: ScottL 11 September 2015 01:16PM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Comments (12)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: ScottL 14 September 2015 11:26:13AM 0 points [-]

half of all starting configurations are unable to end with all cards up and in fact will end with UUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUD.

That is why the starting configuration is explicitly given as: "Twenty random cards are placed in a row all face down". If the number of starting face down cards is odd, then it will terminate with the last card as down and the rest as up. If the number of starting face down cards is even, then it will terminate with all the cards face up.

Comment author: gjm 14 September 2015 11:41:13AM 0 points [-]

Oops, misread the problem statement. Of course you're right. (Though I think the problem is made slightly more interesting if you allow starting with an arbitrary configuration.)