Bet at the races, physicist style

A group of wealthy investors wanted to be able to predict the outcome of a horse race. So, they hired a group of biologists, a group of statisticians, and a group of physicists. Each group was given a year to research. After one year, they all reported to the investors.

The biologists said that they could genetically engineer an unbeatable racehorse, but it would take 200 years and $100 bn.

The statisticians reported next. They said that they could predict the outcome of any race, at a cost of $100 mn a race, and they would only be right 10% of the time.

Finally, the physicists reported they could also predict the outcome of any race, and that their process was cheap and simple. The investors listened eagerly to this proposal. The head physicist reported, ‘We have made several simplifying assumptions: first, let each horse be a perfect rolling sphere….’

Shuffle Those Numbers