Taking A Chance: Calculating Luck at RIT

History is filled with various interpretations of luck and chance. Egyptian Mamluks created a system of cards that were able to translate divine fortune. Mid seventeenth century numerology served much of the same purpose. In Chinese culture, shaken incense was sought to decipher luck… For a modern age, chance can be calculated by the engineering minds in Building 9 at RIT.

Building 9, the James E. Gleason Building, houses the soothsayers that, in place of cards or incense, use carnival games to teach others about chance. Among them is Steve LaLonde, Graduate Program Chair for the John D. Hromi Center for Quality and Applied Statistics. His goal is to create interactive activities that serve both entertainment and educational needs.

One activity set up by LaLonde is a competitive tossing contest in which participants throw bouncing balls into a target space. They must continue to toss the balls until they have successfully hit the target 5 times in a row. Whichever participant has the least amount of throws wins that match. LaLonde was able to predict the performance of participants by using a computer simulation. Within the simulation, LaLonde had a machine throw the ball for 10,000 games until there was enough data to make a reasonable assumption about the human capacity.

With the computer data, LaLonde acknowledges that scores more difficult to achieve deserve a larger prize. Therefore, as a player achieves scores that are farther away from the average results, they will attain a larger prize. These games are going on in the first floor of Building 9, the James E. Gleason Building. Take a chance and try your luck.