Lotto Odds

“Last week 36 million tickets were sold with no winner . . . imagine one individual spent $36 million on tickets. He would have lost everything,” (letter, Feb. 23).

There are two major fallacies in this argument. First, 36 million tickets sold does not mean that 36 million different numerical permutations were entered.

Two or more people often come up with the same 6 numbers as their entry. If one person bought 36 million tickets for himself, he would have a much better chance of winning than 36 million people independently buying one ticket each.

Secondly, the mythical $36-million ticket purchaser would probably not have “lost everything.” Monetary awards are given for combinations of 3, 4 and 5 numbers correct, as well as 5 plus the bonus number. Just because no one wins the big prize one week doesn’t mean that thousands of $5 and up prizes are not won.

Thank heavens some of the lottery money goes to help schools. Perhaps we will finally have citizens properly educated in logic and mathematics!

CATE WONEIS

Redlands