[FRIAM] lurking

[Frank Wimberly]

Remind me never to go to a casino.  The last time I was in one was to meet
my lawyer whose office was in ABQ for lunch so we could split the driving
time.  I almost choked from the cigarette smoke.

---
Frank C. Wimberly
140 Calle Ojo Feliz,
Santa Fe, NM 87505

505 670-9918
Santa Fe, NM

On Mon, Nov 8, 2021, 6:09 PM Prof David West <profwest at fastmail.fm> wrote:

> SteveS,
>
> Your intuitions are spot on, based on my experience. Although casinos
> can't ban cell phones, you may not use one at the table - must step away
> and not have a hand in play. The do detect and ban all kinds of electronic
> transmissions — radio to infrared and if you have such a transmitter on
> your person you are quickly escorted out and banned. Receivers are harder
> to detect except when actively 'receiving' but same result if discovered.
>
> Blackjack has a published 'standard game' written up years ago — casinos
> will actually give you a copy — that maximizes the players odds of winning,
> at least long term. However there are lots of tricks employed to remove
> even that vestige of a chance, like mandatory side bets, and paying even
> odds instead of 3/2 for a blackjack if your bet is below some minimum.
>
> Casinos are also masters of facial recognition — probably better tech than
> anything any government (including China) or Facebook can command. Once
> banned, even hookers, you will never get more than a few feet into a big
> casino before security descends — even if disguised.
>
> Cash game poker, the house takes a standard rake — 10% up to a limit — of
> the pot as table rent and dealers receive tips plus a minimum wage hourly
> rate. Seniority determines which dealers get to service the high limit
> (hence high tips) tables.
>
> Tournaments: house takes a portion of the entry fee and rest goes into
> pot. Dealers get hourly rate, plus tips are collected from winners and
> distributed evenly.
>
> Poker is luck plus very astute inter-personal observation. One of my
> favorite players, Daniel Negreanu, has a Master Class that provides all
> kinds of technical skill, but he does not play that way, instead seat of
> the pants observations and table talk determine his strategy. Not that he
> is unaware of or lacks the technical chops, they are just not the ultimate
> arbitrator of play — mostly because all the others in tournaments at his
> level have the same degree of technical skill.
>
> I did some consulting to casinos a few years back when Highlands was
> trying to start a casino / hospitality program. I have never seen such
> sophisticated and secure systems before or since.
>
> James Swain has a series of mystery books — first in series is *Grift
> Sense* — with plots that center on one major attempt to defraud a casino
> and many little side plots that reveal all the different attempts to
> "cheat" casinos. Fun reads.
>
> A strategy for short term winning at roulette: bet 10 each on two of the
> 1/3 sections of the table (rows or columns) plus one of the 1:1 sections
> (even/odd, red/black, top half-bottom have of the board), plus 1 dollar on
> the 0-00 line (half odds but both covered).  However, this will not work if
> you play more than a 10-15 minutes because it only takes 4.5 times when
> none of your bets hit before you are wiped out. This apparently works
> because the wheel DOES have a bias, mostly from the way the dealer sends
> the ball around the wheel. Watch the history board for patterns that reveal
> the ever so slight but real bias.
>
> davew
>
>
> On Mon, Nov 8, 2021, at 3:51 PM, Steve Smith wrote:
>
> DaveW-
>
> Congratulations (or condolences) on your move to Vegas.  Another reference
> gave me the sense you might be at least *wintering* there.
>
> I probably would not be surprised (though shocked) by what Casinos can
> ban.  I didn't mean to suggest that they didn't have the self-granted
> authority to ban cell phones, etc.  but rather doing so would severely
> impact their popularity among the hordes of marks who happily come to give
> up their spare (or not so) cash to feed the bright lights and other
> egregious displays of wealth.
>
> The Thomas Bass rendition of Farmer et alia foray into exploiting
> manufacturing/wear biases in roulette wheels  Eudamonic Pie
> <https://www.thomasbass.com/the_eudaemonic_pie_1360.htm> suggests that
> today the same effort would be "trivial" with nothing more perhaps than a
> cell phone camera/computer observing from a shirt pocket.    Of course,
> those biases have long since been ameliorated one way or another I am
> sure.
>
> You describe poker tables as the one place the house has no stake in the
> game.  I have to admit that i don't know who pays the rent/real-estate on
> the table?  Is there a flat-rate rake-off from every pot?  Does the dealer
> live on tips?
>
> When the Native Casinos opened here, my elderDotter was turning 18 and she
> had a friend who thought she wanted to grow up to be a blackjack dealer so
> they frequented the casino.  I don't know that my daughter lost/spent much
> money on it, but she never had any illusions that she could "beat the
> house".   I think their game was blackjack which I understand has the
> built-in tiny but positive bias to the house (the house wins all ties by
> convention?).   I told both daughters as they approached college that I had
> saved enough for them to be able to go through a BS/BA degree with only
> part-time/summer work contribution (or healthy scholarship) on their
> part.   I suggested that I cash it out and take it to the casino and drop
> it all on red or black (Roulette) with the understanding that their odds
> ware just a smidge short of doubling their money vs losing it all (the one
> green slot represents the house advantage?).  The conceit was that if they
> *won* they would then have enough cash to "coast" through college as *many*
> of their peers seemed to be supported or else if they *lost* they could
> forego any implied obligation of going to college.   They both honestly
> mulled it for at least 10 seconds before they rolled their eyes and said
> "no way!".
>
> I'm curious how you feel about my claim that the inter-personal dynamic at
> the poker table is in some sense more important than the technical skill?
> My point in your case would be that you would be *at* a table where the
> technical skill level was roughly even, right?   Tournament play tends to
> support that, right?   As you advance, the skill level of your table-peers
> increases until you either step up YOUR game or fail out of the game?
>
> I think of you as having a strong mix of technical approach, intuition,
> and likely to engage in the social-emotional game as well (e.g. bluffing).
>
> - Steve
> On 11/8/21 9:42 AM, Prof David West wrote:
>
> You would be surprised at what casinos can ban. Maybe even more surprised
> at the, not necessarily AI, software tools they use to analyze video feeds
> and pounce on any kind of statistically improbabilities. Most casinos in
> Vegas have tools, like mandatory side bets with very low odds, that erase
> the near equal odds of blackjack.
>
> The only 'safe' gambling is poker where the house has no direct interest
> in the outcome.
>
> As DES stated, winning is a matter of patience and losing antes only,
> until you get good hand and then skill of playing that hand for maximum
> return — playing less worse than the others at the table.
>
> I am living in Vegas now and playing small tournaments fairly regularly.
>
> davew
>
>
> On Sun, Nov 7, 2021, at 7:23 PM, Steve Smith wrote:
>
>
> On 11/7/21 12:02 PM, David Eric Smith wrote:
>
> There must be some kind of “Back to the future” movie that can be made out
> of this.  Doyne Farmer in Vegas all over again, but with current-era AI in
> place of toe-operated computers.
>
> Yah!  Surely Casinos can't begin to restrict computers(phones)/earbuds,
> etc.  on the gaming floor.
>
> Strange coincidence that my sister went to Kindergarten with Vance Packard
> (Norm's brother) in Silver City long before they all became eagle scouts
> and then the Chaos Cabal.  We moved away the next year and I doubt I ever
> met any of them back then.   I came to LANL just before (I think) Doyne
> came... I seem to remember that Norm was there for a summer...  and soon
> came the (in)famous CA conference...   As I remember it the game of
> interest (aside from Life, what with Conway in attendance) was GO with a
> lot of speculation about the implications of local vs global
> "intelligence"...   I was intrigued by HashLife and it's implications for
> finding structure at many scales... I still hope for someone with more
> follow-through than I have to implement a more redundant but "thorough"
> space-time decomposition (an N-1xN-1 kernel over the 4 positions at each
> "zoom" level).
>
> Regarding poker.. I played some low-stakes in college and saw there were
> two things to take in:   the main technical skill was to simply play less
> poorly than the other players at the table and that was entirely
> overshadowed by the social-engineering games of bluffing, etc.   The very
> simple game-theoretic aspect of not depleting your own stake before you
> catch a "lucky streak" going your way was also a good understanding.   I
> played with my "boss" and a number of peers at the time and realized that
> it was more about jockeying for position at work and drinking beer than it
> was about winning/losing.  I think the most I ever lost/won was on the
> order of $20-$40 which in those days was roughly 1-2 shifts wages... a LOT
> if I joined them weekly... too rich for my blood!  I still feel that
> *technically* playing well really means just playing less badly.
> Blackjack being even more obviously so?
>
>
> Yikes.
>
>
>
> On Nov 7, 2021, at 1:56 PM, Marcus Daniels <marcus at snoutfarm.com> wrote:
>
> My inclination would be to invest in standoff biometrics (e.g. Eulerian
> Video Amplification) and then find the best poker playing code.   It ought
> to be possible to automate and perhaps get rich in the process.
>
> *From:* Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com> *On Behalf Of *Eric Charles
> *Sent:* Sunday, November 7, 2021 7:42 AM
> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <
> friam at redfish.com>
> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] lurking
>
> I DID read all the thread so far... but I'm curious how we got to one of
> the starting points: "as cringy as it may be for some dork to be proud of
> their Poker prowess"
>
> I am somewhat satisfied with my Poker mediocrity, certainly not proud of
> it... but if I met someone who was ACTUALLY startlingly better than I am,
> and they were proud of that, I wouldn't find it cringy. (Ditto in my other
> hobbies, like Aikido.)
>
> I guess if I met someone who had a slight edge in their drunk-buddy home
> games, and they were super proud of THAT, then i would find it cringy.
> (Ditto someone who's the best Aikido student in their small dojo, but who's
> obviously not more than that.)
>
> When I see academic work on game theory, it's usually of lower quality
> than what the good poker players are doing these days. Mastering the game
> is crazy hard, and being able to sit down and implement a coherent and
> winning strategy for 40-80 hours a week is not easy. So... why would that
> be cringe?
>
>
>
> On Wed, Nov 3, 2021 at 1:42 PM Marcus Daniels <marcus at snoutfarm.com>
> wrote:
>
> Ok, part of the story is knowing what is really needed for reproducibility
> as a function of context.
> With that, then there's the matter of how much control is afforded.   Is
> it programmable in predictable ways?
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com> On Behalf Of u?l? ?>$
> Sent: Wednesday, November 3, 2021 8:20 AM
> To: friam at redfish.com
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] lurking
>
> Yeah, I agree. But context is Queen. When the virus is created in the lab,
> it's done with real stuff distilled from the soupy world. Given enough of a
> difference in context, the robot may not be able to re-constitute the life
> because the soupy world surrounding the robot doesn't have the real stuff
> required. Such drastic context changes could be a result of translation
> through space or time. E.g. trying to construct, on Mars, an organism
> read/serialized on earth. Or e.g. trying to construct an organism read
> millennia ago, millennia in the future. It's naive to talk about "science"
> as if any given read-out formula thereby expressed is *complete*. Science
> is abstraction to a large extent ... maybe not as abstracting as math, of
> course. And science must remain "open" precisely because any formula it
> expresses is suspect, perhaps incomplete.
>
> My favorite example is the magic brewing stick:
> https://medievalmeadandbeer.wordpress.com/2019/05/04/scandinavian-yeast-logs-yeast-rings/
>  It *was* scientific to lay out the magic stick as a critical element of
> the brewing process, only to discover later that the stick isn't the
> important part.
>
> On 11/2/21 2:39 PM, Marcus Daniels wrote:
> > Even if that were so, viruses have been pulled from history or tweaked
> and created in the lab.   So we have a design specification, and the means
> to make it.    One could imagine a robot fabricating the close-to-the-metal
> machine too.   There is a story one can write down how it is done.   If
> there is no story, it is not science we are talking about, it is something
> else.
>
>
> --
> "Better to be slapped with the truth than kissed with a lie."
> ☤>$ uǝlƃ
>
>
> .-- .- -. - / .- -.-. - .. --- -. ..--.. / -.-. --- -. .--- ..- --. .- - .
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn UTC-6  bit.ly/virtualfriam
> un/subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> <https://linkprotect.cudasvc.com/url?a=http%3a%2f%2fredfish.com%2fmailman%2flistinfo%2ffriam_redfish.com&c=E,1,zW4gfnCEw-aapRghh7ny5t03MK3Rq3qBzZPN7MbtdXMnfOx5f1a4BOQ_kZjD5TYhhqAHjIi_GHC0cpNID7QmaQdIJEXPdJvp7e2YSj9T-Q,,&typo=1>
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/
> <https://linkprotect.cudasvc.com/url?a=http%3a%2f%2ffriam-comic.blogspot.com%2f&c=E,1,42WSfvOtpfV6Y4enUg6wuYty46Wym2X7PyXyWfqyenKLBcLVwb23M3brrQe1Ygpnu_evLvZtxEK7bFkcshitkPmAQPpH4xkXwt8LCX6FnP03&typo=1>
> archives:
>  5/2017 thru present https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/
> <https://linkprotect.cudasvc.com/url?a=https%3a%2f%2fredfish.com%2fpipermail%2ffriam_redfish.com%2f&c=E,1,iXEKOh_9svoFHHsCWA0TbwlILOY3IsE9XdwRauUf8WPQ2GKKbDvhQxuC-IF8qq3KWrXqLIrNxnxVLUtsqex7IJejGUSNsMIb8RUoRuriAA,,&typo=1>
>  1/2003 thru 6/2021  http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/
>
> .-- .- -. - / .- -.-. - .. --- -. ..--.. / -.-. --- -. .--- ..- --. .- - .
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn UTC-6  bit.ly/virtualfriam
> un/subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> <https://linkprotect.cudasvc.com/url?a=http%3a%2f%2fredfish.com%2fmailman%2flistinfo%2ffriam_redfish.com&c=E,1,xOjquKj_8PwgYgPetFZ4iffchk0Hsdj7KqKj_7lgxEu0hJ4JKtFeVvWGlSzPBqsqqlGfsC7QC4-6YEI60Sn8KQ-dv4hRIYgns3yIkdh09Q,,&typo=1>
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/
> <https://linkprotect.cudasvc.com/url?a=http%3a%2f%2ffriam-comic.blogspot.com%2f&c=E,1,OtAeUIEXCxUwWlqYdvcpIascVLmMUGFiI0gBRxXqVzPmRDbvz5UW-aBrVg13FiWo3wnj2yGqP2_WzOFRCT60GYXt-MJh8V2srmxRoK5gQ60,&typo=1>
> archives:
>  5/2017 thru present https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/
> <https://linkprotect.cudasvc.com/url?a=https%3a%2f%2fredfish.com%2fpipermail%2ffriam_redfish.com%2f&c=E,1,LsKAo_HeNNvVn8e0cDxtHSeLoR3npW-8RPv-a1uTz8vlkpY2g2ckzynNVrsHBLDwefpJafaKIGFZoge5o85zAT3C5I3LbGDSN7M2EA8NsSwMyPY8YbRj&typo=1>
>  1/2003 thru 6/2021  http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/
>
>
> .-- .- -. - / .- -.-. - .. --- -. ..--.. / -.-. --- -. .--- ..- --. .- - .
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn UTC-6  bit.ly/virtualfriam
> un/subscribe
> https://linkprotect.cudasvc.com/url?a=http%3a%2f%2fredfish.com%2fmailman%2flistinfo%2ffriam_redfish.com&c=E,1,_BlHnyrN4CBEuprXVVy7f_mq3Z-tTWnNTUoEVL2wFjffa3W39HZm7739L-ersuH4jGwn4lOKTAQ0a8LW3Rpg5oX0xA-uGCnMO6QYqE4KE3dZO3-wLhX5WWwF7A4,&typo=1
> FRIAM-COMIC
> https://linkprotect.cudasvc.com/url?a=http%3a%2f%2ffriam-comic.blogspot.com%2f&c=E,1,t2v4djJabF5YoxHP9TWOogbl_lizkTlBDrWNSYFDyFQc2oEqq-ghR0tsH7hnRt9tZjI3-MOOrEuLks0GJ9lideLCkCUiGBWRpBsaKIPTaH5r1tdRiQGZ4_qgkg,,&typo=1
> archives:
> 5/2017 thru present
> https://linkprotect.cudasvc.com/url?a=https%3a%2f%2fredfish.com%2fpipermail%2ffriam_redfish.com%2f&c=E,1,1HwvCHzBMHc9q8dL9FwTD6thlBDdmw7i9bSUZebmdoy7AlNV8bl5Inpn6PlDWdxaOG1_3wNax5YCtb2P3_Ct_dVSvtqcKX0fU7ehAs56Y-D2MA,,&typo=1
> 1/2003 thru 6/2021  http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/
>
>
>
> .-- .- -. - / .- -.-. - .. --- -. ..--.. / -.-. --- -. .--- ..- --. .- - .
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn UTC-6  bit.ly/virtualfriam
> un/subscribe <http://bit.ly/virtualfriamun/subscribe> http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/
> archives:
>  5/2017 thru present https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/
>  1/2003 thru 6/2021  http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/
>
>
> .-- .- -. - / .- -.-. - .. --- -. ..--.. / -.-. --- -. .--- ..- --. .- - .
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn UTC-6  bit.ly/virtualfriam
> un/subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/
> archives:
> 5/2017 thru present https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/
> 1/2003 thru 6/2021  http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/
>
>
>
> .-- .- -. - / .- -.-. - .. --- -. ..--.. / -.-. --- -. .--- ..- --. .- - .
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn UTC-6  bit.ly/virtualfriam
> un/subscribe <http://bit.ly/virtualfriamun/subscribe> http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/
> archives:
>  5/2017 thru present https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/
>  1/2003 thru 6/2021  http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/
>
>
> .-- .- -. - / .- -.-. - .. --- -. ..--.. / -.-. --- -. .--- ..- --. .- - .
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn UTC-6  bit.ly/virtualfriam
> un/subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/
> archives:
> 5/2017 thru present https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/
> 1/2003 thru 6/2021  http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/
>
>
>
> .-- .- -. - / .- -.-. - .. --- -. ..--.. / -.-. --- -. .--- ..- --. .- - .
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn UTC-6  bit.ly/virtualfriam
> un/subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/
> archives:
>  5/2017 thru present https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/
>  1/2003 thru 6/2021  http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/attachments/20211108/2bce8263/attachment.html>