actually, a probability of 0 is totally possible, and it means that something is impossible. this supposed “nerd burn” is actually just a wannabe nerd burn.
Exactly. For example, the probability that the sun will rise in the West tomorrow, given the knowledge we have about the orbit of the Earth around the sun and the Earth’s rotation, is zero.
In this case the OP is right, because the probability that they’ll attend to you straightaway in a hospital emergency room is pretty much zero unless you’re dying in a gory and spectacular way. (If you’re dying quietly sometimes they just ignore you until it happens.)
thank you for pointing that out! I couldn’t be sure if I remembered correctly, but 0 just sounds like it’s really improbable (otherwise known as impossible). To quote the Wikipedia (which I doubt has been edited falsely on this rather unplayful topic)
“An impossible event has a probability of 0, and a certain event has a probability of 1″
In fairness that’s only true because those sneaky scientists insist on “updating” the known laws every time someone does something they previously said was impossible.
I have to agree with Steve-O here, them physicists are pretty damn sneaky.
There was a time when the laws of physics stated that it was impossible for man to travel faster than the speed of sound. Now I’m pretty sure they messure fighter jet speeds by how much faster than sound it can travel.
Well, here’s the funny: There are those nasty irreversible events, like the broken glass can’t just remade into one by itself, or your pencil fallen out of your hands can’t just simply hop back. Well that’s not exactly true, because they can. There is a chance, that, when you used all of your mom’s expensive parfume, just because it’s fun to spray, the molecules of the parfume go up into the corner and form the head of Stalin.
The truth is, that to an event like that to occour, you would have to wait about 10^60 years.
Not necessarily. Probability is ultimately an abstraction. There is no conclusive evidence that events could happen in any way probabilistically. It is conclusively known due to heisenberg uncertainty that there is no way we could say that a seemingly low probability event wouldn’t occur. In other words, we can’t rule out the possibility of a “Stalin-perfume-head.”
However, it is also possible that the universe is entirely deterministic but based upon unobservable elements. In that case, the probability of a “Stalin-perfume-head” would be either 0 or 1. It is either going to happen or not. No randomness.
In other words, there is no way to conclusively prove that there is any probability actually driving the universe. There would be no experiment possible that would be able to prove the difference between a deterministic universe driven by unobservable elements versus a probabilistic one based upon known elements.
So, there could certainly be things with zero probability or not. There is simply no way to know. With that said, a one-dimensional infinite Markov chain would not have a random walk reach all of its states in infinite time unless it had exactly zero drift. Take that as you will. If the universe is driven by probability, the potential exists that the universe is non-ergodic (and certain states simply cannot be reached from other states). If the universe is deterministic, then only one state path is possible and all others have probability zero.
You have a box filled with only 10 blue balls and 5 red balls. You draw a ball at random without looking. What is the probability that you draw a green ball? 0!!!???!!! Crazy. A probability CAN be 0.
If you change the qualifications for the situation then the statistics no longer apply. If my physics teacher gave me a problem about the amount of time it took for a ball to hit the ground if tossed off a building of X height assuming perfect vacuum to negate wind and air resistance I can’t respond with “We have no way of knowing that a hawk won’t swoop down and catch it”. If there were a hawk in the tube it wouldn’t be a vacuum.
If someone changes out your box for a box full of green balls then of course it’s going to change. In real life we’ll rarely see probability of 0 but how often do we work with real life in the classroom?
You calculate probabilities based on what you know of a situation. If something happens that was thought to be impossible, there are two things that may have happened:
1) There was some initial condition that you didn’t know about or had incorrect info on (such as a green ball making its way into the box of red and white balls).
2) There is something you didn’t take into account in your calculations (such as that the red “balls” are Stoplight Balls, that can turn green randomly).
So, the probability of drawing a green ball given comma man’s setup is zero. If you draw a green ball anyway, your initial assumptions or calculations have to be questioned.
(Which is why so many people are bad at troubleshooting… they get hung up on “That’s IMPOSSIBLE!” because they have trouble revising what they “know” about the situation.)
if the probability is zero, then that means absolute certainty that it won’t happen, and absolute certainty is impossible to attain, because there always remains the possibility that most of the knowledge we already know is faulty.
No…
For example:
Choose a random real number from the [0,1] interval…
Since the count of the real numbers in this interval is infinite, the probability of choosing 0.5 is zero, but it can happen.
It’s not actually zero, depending on how you express it. You’d really be stating that probability of any particular number is something like:
d1/dx
If evaluated, this generates a value of 0. With that said, if integrated by x, it forms a value of 1.
Alternatively, d0/dx will be zero if you evaluate it or if you integrate it. So then, if you evaluate first, integrating either by x will give you 0. But if you postpone evaluating then they have different values.
Really this just states the fact that the results of an evaluated differentiation are non-invertible. That that said, if all the probabilities of every point in a probability density were exactly zero then you’d be stating something very different than saying that the probabilities were an infinitely small delta.
Probalility can also be from a sample. So if the poster had visited a dozen hospitals, and all of them had wait times, the probability of a hospital with no wait is 0.
Probability can “predict” the future, but it can also describe previous experiments.
The odds of landing tails is .5. But if you did an experiment, and got tails 75 out of 100 times, you can say the. Probability is .75.
One is describing future possibilities, the other describes the experiment.
I forget the technical terms, I’d have to look the up.
No she is saying that the scenarios in which there is no wait have measure 0 among the space of all scenarios. For example if only a finite number of scenarios involve no waiting, and there are infinitely many scenarios with a uniform probability measure. Probability 0 does NOT mean impossible. The reason people usually think this is because they restrict consideration to events with a finite number of outcomes. But even then, probability 0 is an entirely valid probability.
Actually we are missing a factor here. It also depends on the severity of the sickness or injury. If it is severe enough then there will be no wait. They will take you right back.
Cut finger probability of wait = a bajillion
Heart attack probability of wait = 0
Solution = always say you’re having a heart attack… and hey doc, while I’m here could you sew up this pesky bleeding artery??
I beg to differ that the probability of a wait is 0 even with a heart attack. It might be small, but if a hospital is incredibly small and/or understaffed, there might still be a short wait.
“The probability can only be 0 if no prior tests have shown a single positive (1).”
If you are using inductive methods, yeah. If you’re using deductive methods, you can theorize a zero probability in the absence of any direct testing of the event, based on observable inputs.
Sure it can. Unless you built your ER waiting room with a person in it, somebody has to be first, right? So she just needs to make sure she’s the first person into a newly opened ER. QED.
Will doesn’t know what he is talking about. As someone with an MS in Statistics, I can tell you that he can’t even argue that theory is on his side. It’s exactly what John said… an impossible act has a probability of 0. This is a stupid “fail”.
In theory, the probability can be zero but because we usually lack some piece of knowledge that has to be estimated from the data, we can only ever approximate a true probability distribution. So, essentially it can’t be zero but it can come very, very close.
Seriously people?…I have a degree in statistics and used to teach intro stat. For the purposes of a beginner statistics course…she had the right idea in her facebook status. All of the “technicality” isn’t really necessary…she wasn’t being totally dumb and “needing to go back to class” making a joke like that. You don’t learn those technicalities about “probability not really being zero” or proving things like that until higher level courses….give the girl a break…there is no debate…this really wasn’t that big of a fail…if one at all. Its debates like this that make people so scared of statistics in the first place.
Assuming time is continuous (and not discrete), the probability of you having to wait EXACTLY zero seconds is zero (or infinitesimal).
And if Rachel has a-priori knowledge of the waiting time (maybe she knows it will always take a small amount of time before people see her), she can also claim the waiting time is zero.
Actually I disagree. It’s possible that Rachel wasn’t the one needing to be seen but the deliverer of the sick/injured/possibly dying. So, she could very well be facebooking (even though it would be a little irresponsible but still it’s a probability).
I, in fact, was the deliverer (sans facebooking) of the possibly dying just this week and she did not wait. They took her back immediately. 0 wait.
Oh and she’s fine by the way. Kept her and removed her gall bladder. Home and happily drugged now.
Except, if she’s not actually the patient, the entire visit consists of waiting… waiting for the person she’s accompanying to be released or admitted.
And *usually*, if you think that the person you’re with is possibly dying, you’d arrive by ambulance anyway. (The probability of that is not 1, however; I know at least one person whose husband took her to the hospital for “chest pain/shortness of breath” and neither of them realized how potentially lethal her condition was… fortunately the ER personnel did, and took her back immediately. She just celebrated her 11th anniversary of surviving deep-vein thrombosis.)
Well you’re correct there. I waited. I waited until 2:30am. And chest pain was why I took her to the hospital. And “possibly dying” was an exaggeration meant to infer something other than the flu or a cut… trust me, I wanted an ambulance but she was having none of that. But still…. Here are now two solid instances of no waiting at the ER… well except for the deliverer.
So I recant. There is almost always waiting at the ER for somebody. Hours and hours and hours of waiting.
*snort* As an ER employee I can safely tell you that there’s ALWAYS a wait. It doesn’t matter when you come in. There’s always a wait. The only time there isn’t a wait is around 4-5 am and even then there’s usually a small wait.
No there is not ALWAYS….. Oh employee of all ER’s everywhere……
(In case you don’t read previous posts)…
I, in fact, was the deliverer (sans facebooking) of the possibly dying just this week and she did not wait. They took her back immediately. 0 wait.
Oh and she’s fine by the way. Kept her and removed her gall bladder. Home and happily drugged now.
When Mogdor come to ER, there is no wait. Mogdor kill and pillage all in waiting room, as part of general kill and pillage way of life. Mogdor enters waiting room, kills peoples waiting, refuses to show insurance information, and threatens doctors with death unless he receives treatment. After Mogdor receives treatment, Mogdor kills doctors anyways, then pillages hospital.
Modgor is away that kill and pillaging time in waiting room may be considered by puny peons as waiting, but Mogdor would have killed and pillaged them anyways so there was really no additional time cost. Hence, Mogdor NEVER wait for ER.
And if disagree with Mogdor… MOGDOR KILL AND PILLAGE YOU.
Mogdor is AWARE that kill and pillaging time in waiting room is not called “away that kill and pillaging time.” And if dislike, Mogdor KILL and PILLAGE Grammar Nazi tribe!
actually I’ve seen situations where patients with injuries that weren’t life threatening didn’t have to wait. They just gave us the paperwork in the room. It was a slow day in the ER.
But we don’t have enough information about Rachel and her health insurance to know whether this is a possible scenario for her. If she’s taking a statistics class, she is probably using school-provided health insurance, and is likely to be limited in which hospitals she can use (possibly only a single one affiliated with her university). It’s also possible that Rachel is aware that the hospital she’s going to has a chronic issue with ER waiting time, and even that the hospital deliberately staffs the ER with an expectation that there will be a wait of X minutes (i.e. having staff on call or sent home early to stabilize on that waiting time).
Perhaps the above scenario isn’t likely, but the point is, we haven’t enough information to make a prediction. Presumably Rachel has more information than we do.
Statistically, as a bullsh!t artist, I can tell you that starting almost any sentence with the word ‘statistically’ generally enables you to get away with any old crap, no matter how improbable or impossible it may be.
Statistically, I agree.
Statistically, It’s all in the delivery.
Statistically, for example, I have a friend that continuously makes up words because he can’t remember the correct word that he’s looking for. And usually, it’s a combination of words. But, when he’s talking and throws them into conversation he is so convincing that it’s an actual word that you’re left going… wait? what??
Statistically, I usually catch it but watching the other people’s faces is priceless. And then later I tell him his word is bulls**t and we laugh about it.
My point? I don’t really have one. Your comment just made me think of that.
In high school I had this very argument about a friend of mine’s dad. It got quite heated, and after that he disliked me and didn’t want me at their house anymore.
With that said, you are entirely correct. There is no way that nothing is impossible, since that would mean that impossibility is impossible. Admittedly, this straddles the boundary of the conceptual vs the physical, but at least on the conceptual plane this is correct. This means it is at least possible for a concept to have zero probability, one way or another.
What is fail, is the 1300 people who voted up on this. In quantum mechanics probabilities of 0 appear all of the time for disallowed states. Fermi’s exclusion principle depends on this. People are so science retarded.
Sadly true. A little learning is a dangerous thing, as reading all of the above comments shows.
p can be zero.
Rachel was making a joke, not a statement of eternal truth.
Will, like *many* of the above commenters, should have paid more attention in stats class.
BURN!
I find this unfunny.
me too.
You two are just a small number on the statistics anyway.
Here I thought idiots were a growing statistic…
Let p = Probability that Derek and Will are idiots, then:
p – 1 = 0
Haha gotta love nerd burn
actually, a probability of 0 is totally possible, and it means that something is impossible. this supposed “nerd burn” is actually just a wannabe nerd burn.
Exactly. For example, the probability that the sun will rise in the West tomorrow, given the knowledge we have about the orbit of the Earth around the sun and the Earth’s rotation, is zero.
yeah, but there is a possibility that our assumptions about physics and the way our solar system works or even exists is false…
Yeah, this makes me *facepalm. Seriously, how is p=0 impossible?
In this case the OP is right, because the probability that they’ll attend to you straightaway in a hospital emergency room is pretty much zero unless you’re dying in a gory and spectacular way. (If you’re dying quietly sometimes they just ignore you until it happens.)
You just contradicted yourself.
Backing up. The possibility can be 0 (0%). It means ‘impossible’. Also it can be 1 (100%), which means it’s definitely happening.
BURN of BURN…
thank you for pointing that out!
I couldn’t be sure if I remembered correctly, but 0 just sounds like it’s really improbable (otherwise known as impossible). To quote the Wikipedia (which I doubt has been edited falsely on this rather unplayful topic)
“An impossible event has a probability of 0, and a certain event has a probability of 1″
Except the probability CAN be zero, so Will is the one in need of basic stats classes.
(Rachel is clearly saying it is an impossibility that there will be no waiting at the hospital.)
Exactly… Furthermore events of probability zero can happen
Ehh, no. If it’s zero probability then it can’t happend. If it can happen probability most be >0.
Yeah but, nothing is impossible.
except breaking the laws of physics.
In fairness that’s only true because those sneaky scientists insist on “updating” the known laws every time someone does something they previously said was impossible.
I have to agree with Steve-O here, them physicists are pretty damn sneaky.
There was a time when the laws of physics stated that it was impossible for man to travel faster than the speed of sound. Now I’m pretty sure they messure fighter jet speeds by how much faster than sound it can travel.
Wrong idiot. The laws of physics have never said it’s impossible to fly faster than the speed of sound.
No there wasn’t. Where did you get that crap from?
They admit they were wrong, yes.
Well, here’s the funny: There are those nasty irreversible events, like the broken glass can’t just remade into one by itself, or your pencil fallen out of your hands can’t just simply hop back. Well that’s not exactly true, because they can. There is a chance, that, when you used all of your mom’s expensive parfume, just because it’s fun to spray, the molecules of the parfume go up into the corner and form the head of Stalin.
The truth is, that to an event like that to occour, you would have to wait about 10^60 years.
Isn’t string theory amazing.
Not necessarily. Probability is ultimately an abstraction. There is no conclusive evidence that events could happen in any way probabilistically. It is conclusively known due to heisenberg uncertainty that there is no way we could say that a seemingly low probability event wouldn’t occur. In other words, we can’t rule out the possibility of a “Stalin-perfume-head.”
However, it is also possible that the universe is entirely deterministic but based upon unobservable elements. In that case, the probability of a “Stalin-perfume-head” would be either 0 or 1. It is either going to happen or not. No randomness.
In other words, there is no way to conclusively prove that there is any probability actually driving the universe. There would be no experiment possible that would be able to prove the difference between a deterministic universe driven by unobservable elements versus a probabilistic one based upon known elements.
So, there could certainly be things with zero probability or not. There is simply no way to know. With that said, a one-dimensional infinite Markov chain would not have a random walk reach all of its states in infinite time unless it had exactly zero drift. Take that as you will. If the universe is driven by probability, the potential exists that the universe is non-ergodic (and certain states simply cannot be reached from other states). If the universe is deterministic, then only one state path is possible and all others have probability zero.
*pets Schrodinger’s cat*
*or doesn’t*
P=0 totally applies to physical systems.
What is the probability that the high temperature tomorrow will be exactly 76.35721 degrees F?
For any normal distribution, the probability of any particular result is 0, because there are an infinite number of possible results.
No, it can quite clearly be absolute zero.
If I pull an ace of spades from a deck of cards, the probabilty of the next card being an ace of spades is 0/51 = 0
No rounding necessary.
Unless the deck has been rigged, in which case it would be possible that there is another ace of spades.
Ok, and what’s the probability in a non-rigged set which contains only one ace of spades?
You have a box filled with only 10 blue balls and 5 red balls. You draw a ball at random without looking. What is the probability that you draw a green ball? 0!!!???!!! Crazy. A probability CAN be 0.
Well, if by some unforeseen events, a green ball made into the box, then it’s probability is above 0.
If you change the qualifications for the situation then the statistics no longer apply. If my physics teacher gave me a problem about the amount of time it took for a ball to hit the ground if tossed off a building of X height assuming perfect vacuum to negate wind and air resistance I can’t respond with “We have no way of knowing that a hawk won’t swoop down and catch it”. If there were a hawk in the tube it wouldn’t be a vacuum.
If someone changes out your box for a box full of green balls then of course it’s going to change. In real life we’ll rarely see probability of 0 but how often do we work with real life in the classroom?
You calculate probabilities based on what you know of a situation. If something happens that was thought to be impossible, there are two things that may have happened:
1) There was some initial condition that you didn’t know about or had incorrect info on (such as a green ball making its way into the box of red and white balls).
2) There is something you didn’t take into account in your calculations (such as that the red “balls” are Stoplight Balls, that can turn green randomly).
So, the probability of drawing a green ball given comma man’s setup is zero. If you draw a green ball anyway, your initial assumptions or calculations have to be questioned.
(Which is why so many people are bad at troubleshooting… they get hung up on “That’s IMPOSSIBLE!” because they have trouble revising what they “know” about the situation.)
A great many things are statistically impossible.
What are the odds of Hitler winning the next presidential election?
Godwin’s law FTW!
There are a great many things that are statistically impossible.
What are the odds of Hitler being elected the next president of he US?
Godwin’s law FTW!
I believe you are correct.
if the probability is zero, then that means absolute certainty that it won’t happen, and absolute certainty is impossible to attain, because there always remains the possibility that most of the knowledge we already know is faulty.
No…
For example:
Choose a random real number from the [0,1] interval…
Since the count of the real numbers in this interval is infinite, the probability of choosing 0.5 is zero, but it can happen.
It’s not actually zero, depending on how you express it. You’d really be stating that probability of any particular number is something like:
d1/dx
If evaluated, this generates a value of 0. With that said, if integrated by x, it forms a value of 1.
Alternatively, d0/dx will be zero if you evaluate it or if you integrate it. So then, if you evaluate first, integrating either by x will give you 0. But if you postpone evaluating then they have different values.
Really this just states the fact that the results of an evaluated differentiation are non-invertible. That that said, if all the probabilities of every point in a probability density were exactly zero then you’d be stating something very different than saying that the probabilities were an infinitely small delta.
Probalility can also be from a sample. So if the poster had visited a dozen hospitals, and all of them had wait times, the probability of a hospital with no wait is 0.
Probability can “predict” the future, but it can also describe previous experiments.
The odds of landing tails is .5. But if you did an experiment, and got tails 75 out of 100 times, you can say the. Probability is .75.
One is describing future possibilities, the other describes the experiment.
I forget the technical terms, I’d have to look the up.
Ok, Jigain, I am a statistician and I found your post excruciatingly boring……not helping advance the cause much.
It’s just a Poisson distribution: predicting the time until the next event…ie: waiting times at the hospital.
I’m sorry, but statistics aren’t really meant to be fun and enjoyable – there’s other pasttimes for that.
In practice yes, however, mathematically, there is always the possibility.
Therefore, Wills claim that ‘it can’t be zero’, is false.
0 probability means, there is no probability.
Now read this again starting behind the comma.
No she is saying that the scenarios in which there is no wait have measure 0 among the space of all scenarios. For example if only a finite number of scenarios involve no waiting, and there are infinitely many scenarios with a uniform probability measure. Probability 0 does NOT mean impossible. The reason people usually think this is because they restrict consideration to events with a finite number of outcomes. But even then, probability 0 is an entirely valid probability.
What about if there are zero hospitals for her to wait in line? What’s the probability then?
Now that I’ve tried to read that, what would you say the probability of me ever reading one of your comments again is?
Lols
haha
Actually we are missing a factor here. It also depends on the severity of the sickness or injury. If it is severe enough then there will be no wait. They will take you right back.
Cut finger probability of wait = a bajillion
Heart attack probability of wait = 0
Solution = always say you’re having a heart attack… and hey doc, while I’m here could you sew up this pesky bleeding artery??
I beg to differ that the probability of a wait is 0 even with a heart attack. It might be small, but if a hospital is incredibly small and/or understaffed, there might still be a short wait.
“The probability can only be 0 if no prior tests have shown a single positive (1).”
If you are using inductive methods, yeah. If you’re using deductive methods, you can theorize a zero probability in the absence of any direct testing of the event, based on observable inputs.
Sure it can. Unless you built your ER waiting room with a person in it, somebody has to be first, right? So she just needs to make sure she’s the first person into a newly opened ER. QED.
really NOT funny
F**k this, I’m out!
Will doesn’t know what he is talking about. As someone with an MS in Statistics, I can tell you that he can’t even argue that theory is on his side. It’s exactly what John said… an impossible act has a probability of 0. This is a stupid “fail”.
To put it simply, probability is defined as being between 0 and 1… so yeah, a 0 probability is possible.
you just contradicted yourself
between 0 and 1 means 0<x<1.
What ever happened to deterministic distributions?
In theory, the probability can be zero but because we usually lack some piece of knowledge that has to be estimated from the data, we can only ever approximate a true probability distribution. So, essentially it can’t be zero but it can come very, very close.
In other words, you are claiming that the probability, of any probability that you calculate, never being absolute zero, is absolute zero?
In theory, you have just disproved your claim.
That was beautiful.
Seriously people?…I have a degree in statistics and used to teach intro stat. For the purposes of a beginner statistics course…she had the right idea in her facebook status. All of the “technicality” isn’t really necessary…she wasn’t being totally dumb and “needing to go back to class” making a joke like that. You don’t learn those technicalities about “probability not really being zero” or proving things like that until higher level courses….give the girl a break…there is no debate…this really wasn’t that big of a fail…if one at all. Its debates like this that make people so scared of statistics in the first place.
Dude. Its a hospital. You’re gonna wait. Done. Anything further is semantics and is unnecessary
Kbj out!!!!
Assuming time is continuous (and not discrete), the probability of you having to wait EXACTLY zero seconds is zero (or infinitesimal).
And if Rachel has a-priori knowledge of the waiting time (maybe she knows it will always take a small amount of time before people see her), she can also claim the waiting time is zero.
ZOMFGWTFBBQ1111!!!! SOMEBODY’S GONNA DIVIDE BY ZERO…RUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUN AS FAST AS YOU CAN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
10/10 statistics are b.s.
Actually I disagree. It’s possible that Rachel wasn’t the one needing to be seen but the deliverer of the sick/injured/possibly dying. So, she could very well be facebooking (even though it would be a little irresponsible but still it’s a probability).
I, in fact, was the deliverer (sans facebooking) of the possibly dying just this week and she did not wait. They took her back immediately. 0 wait.
Oh and she’s fine by the way. Kept her and removed her gall bladder. Home and happily drugged now.
Except, if she’s not actually the patient, the entire visit consists of waiting… waiting for the person she’s accompanying to be released or admitted.
And *usually*, if you think that the person you’re with is possibly dying, you’d arrive by ambulance anyway. (The probability of that is not 1, however; I know at least one person whose husband took her to the hospital for “chest pain/shortness of breath” and neither of them realized how potentially lethal her condition was… fortunately the ER personnel did, and took her back immediately. She just celebrated her 11th anniversary of surviving deep-vein thrombosis.)
Well you’re correct there. I waited. I waited until 2:30am. And chest pain was why I took her to the hospital. And “possibly dying” was an exaggeration meant to infer something other than the flu or a cut… trust me, I wanted an ambulance but she was having none of that. But still…. Here are now two solid instances of no waiting at the ER… well except for the deliverer.
So I recant. There is almost always waiting at the ER for somebody. Hours and hours and hours of waiting.
Probability of waiting at the ER = a bajillion
*sigh*
*snort* As an ER employee I can safely tell you that there’s ALWAYS a wait. It doesn’t matter when you come in. There’s always a wait. The only time there isn’t a wait is around 4-5 am and even then there’s usually a small wait.
*snicker*
No there is not ALWAYS….. Oh employee of all ER’s everywhere……
(In case you don’t read previous posts)…
I, in fact, was the deliverer (sans facebooking) of the possibly dying just this week and she did not wait. They took her back immediately. 0 wait.
Oh and she’s fine by the way. Kept her and removed her gall bladder. Home and happily drugged now.
When Mogdor come to ER, there is no wait. Mogdor kill and pillage all in waiting room, as part of general kill and pillage way of life. Mogdor enters waiting room, kills peoples waiting, refuses to show insurance information, and threatens doctors with death unless he receives treatment. After Mogdor receives treatment, Mogdor kills doctors anyways, then pillages hospital.
Modgor is away that kill and pillaging time in waiting room may be considered by puny peons as waiting, but Mogdor would have killed and pillaged them anyways so there was really no additional time cost. Hence, Mogdor NEVER wait for ER.
And if disagree with Mogdor… MOGDOR KILL AND PILLAGE YOU.
Mogdor is AWARE that kill and pillaging time in waiting room is not called “away that kill and pillaging time.” And if dislike, Mogdor KILL and PILLAGE Grammar Nazi tribe!
I love the fact that the comments section of this fail turned into a discussion of statistics.
Oh come on. Like the probability of that happening wasn’t 100%.
actually I’ve seen situations where patients with injuries that weren’t life threatening didn’t have to wait. They just gave us the paperwork in the room. It was a slow day in the ER.
But we don’t have enough information about Rachel and her health insurance to know whether this is a possible scenario for her. If she’s taking a statistics class, she is probably using school-provided health insurance, and is likely to be limited in which hospitals she can use (possibly only a single one affiliated with her university). It’s also possible that Rachel is aware that the hospital she’s going to has a chronic issue with ER waiting time, and even that the hospital deliberately staffs the ER with an expectation that there will be a wait of X minutes (i.e. having staff on call or sent home early to stabilize on that waiting time).
Perhaps the above scenario isn’t likely, but the point is, we haven’t enough information to make a prediction. Presumably Rachel has more information than we do.
Or, she’s living in any developped country in the western world that isn’t the US and has universal healthcare…
Statistically, as a bullsh!t artist, I can tell you that starting almost any sentence with the word ‘statistically’ generally enables you to get away with any old crap, no matter how improbable or impossible it may be.
Statistically, I agree.
Statistically, It’s all in the delivery.
Statistically, for example, I have a friend that continuously makes up words because he can’t remember the correct word that he’s looking for. And usually, it’s a combination of words. But, when he’s talking and throws them into conversation he is so convincing that it’s an actual word that you’re left going… wait? what??
Statistically, I usually catch it but watching the other people’s faces is priceless. And then later I tell him his word is bulls**t and we laugh about it.
My point? I don’t really have one. Your comment just made me think of that.
If it’s impossible for the probability to be zero, then the probability of the probability being zero is zero. Contradiction.
In high school I had this very argument about a friend of mine’s dad. It got quite heated, and after that he disliked me and didn’t want me at their house anymore.
With that said, you are entirely correct. There is no way that nothing is impossible, since that would mean that impossibility is impossible. Admittedly, this straddles the boundary of the conceptual vs the physical, but at least on the conceptual plane this is correct. This means it is at least possible for a concept to have zero probability, one way or another.
I hate you both and get out of my house. Nothing is impossible, that’s hogwash.
What is fail, is the 1300 people who voted up on this. In quantum mechanics probabilities of 0 appear all of the time for disallowed states. Fermi’s exclusion principle depends on this. People are so science retarded.
Sadly true. A little learning is a dangerous thing, as reading all of the above comments shows.
p can be zero.
Rachel was making a joke, not a statement of eternal truth.
Will, like *many* of the above commenters, should have paid more attention in stats class.