A revolver with 6 chambers, only loaded with 1 bullet. After randomly spinning the chamber, if you pull the trigger once, if you win, you get a prize of 1 million; if you lose, you die immediately.

100 people play this game at the same time, and eventually, about 83 people will survive to get 1 million, while only 17 people will die. In terms of monetary gain, the average expected return for the group is as high as 830,000, with a win rate of over 83%. It seems like a very worthwhile gamble.

However, if you play this game continuously by yourself, the probability of surviving the first time is 5/6, but after playing 6 times, the probability of surviving drops to 33%, and after playing 20 times, the probability of survival is less than 3%. As long as you keep playing, the probability of dying will eventually approach 100%, no matter how high the single-game win rate is, the long-term outcome must be total elimination.

You cannot use the average earnings of some people doing this to predict your own long-term outcome. Because you only see the glory of the survivors, but you do not see those who have completely exited, and you are even less aware that as long as you keep playing, you will eventually encounter that outcome where you can never recover.

The most extreme exit points: death, permanent physical disability.

Exit points in investments: liquidation, permanent loss of principal.

Exit points in life: criminal offenses resulting in sentencing, huge debts that cannot be repaid, major illnesses leading to a complete loss of labor ability.

As long as there are such permanent exit points in a matter, regardless of how high its single-game win rate is or how tempting the expected return is, it is non-recursive.

Because the essence of probability is the law of large numbers. As long as the number of repetitions is sufficient, even an event with a very small probability will definitely occur.

Just like driving without a seatbelt, the probability of an accident in a single instance is less than one in ten thousand, but driving for a lifetime without a seatbelt will raise the probability of an accident to a terrifying level...

Every time you take a gamble with a sense of luck, you are burying mines in your life. As long as the number of mines is sufficient, there will always be one that will explode, and once it explodes, you lose everything. #btc