Psychic Oz Lotto

Well, the results are in - I suck at Lotto, my family suck at Lotto, Random.org sucks at Lotto and so-called "astrologer, numerologist, psychic" Milton Black apparently sucks at Lotto.

Tonight's seven number draw (excluding supplementaries) was:

• 3, 12, 21, 23, 29, 38, 40

You'll recall my sourced numbers were:

• D: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7
  
• S: 29, 5, 13, 22, 25, 31, 45
  
• W: 19, 28, 7, 9, 15, 32, 45
  
• R: 17, 23, 30, 34, 29, 1, 15
  
• P: 2, 11, 17, 22, 25, 29, 43

D = Daughter = 1 hit (3)
S = Son = 1 hit (29)
W = Wife = No hits (I'm not laughing)
R = random.org = 2 hits (23, 29)
P = random.org lottery pick = 1 hit (29)

Pretty sad all round really. Random.org won with just two hits. So how did Milton do, based on my assessment of his vague ramblings? I deduced the following long list of numbers from what was quoted in the Daily Mail:

• M: 3, 6, 8, 9, 12, 15, 18, 21, 24, 27, 30, 33, 36, 39, 42, 45

As stated yesterday, this many numbers considerably increases your chances, with over 11,000 possible combinations reducing the odds to about 1 in 4000, but did it help? Not really. Despite having 16 numbers to hit, based mostly on his suggestion that numbers divisible by three were significant, Milton only scored a three (3, 12, 21). Even the supplementary numbers (22, 43) don't help his case. (This might answer my question about Librans who ignored values of three - they might have done better than anyone who followed the numerical advice.)

Milton's 3/16 is pretty miserable compared to random.org's 2/7 and it's worth noting that to cover all bases with those 16 numbers, you'd need to play over 11,000 games (I don't think they do a "System 11000"), at a cost of over $12,000 - and you wouldn't have won a cent back! So much for numerology.

Now, Milton did say 12 was significant, and it came up. But he also said 8 was significant, and it didn't come up so if we can conclude that he was right, we can equally conclude he was wrong, unless we choose to focus only on hits and ignore misses.

Serious numerologists will no doubt point to 23 and 38 as numbers that "include number 3" and maybe to 29 which contains one number divisible by 3 and maybe even 40 though I can't mangle my brain enough to come with an excuse for including 40 in Milton's vague offerings, except maybe that it's a multiple of that special number 8.

Even OZ Lotto aren't much use when it comes to predicting outcomes. The Daily Mail article says:

According to Oz Lotto, the most frequent numbers drawn are 35, 17, 33, 20, 3, 27 and 16.

(I don't know why they were listed in that apparently random order. Any guesses?) Of those, only number 3 came up tonight.

And poor old "Anonymous" who commented in yesterday's article about an unbeatable combination of 18 numbers - well, no joy there either I'm afraid. I'm surprised, seriously. We were only told of one "for sure" number - 16 - so I hope Anonymous didn't tell his or her employer where to jam it today - that job might still come in handy since 16 was not in tonight's draw.

I promised Anonymous that I already knew what the numbers would be and that I would expose them here. Well, my spirit guides were a little bit naughty but I assure you that, had I played, I would have chosen 3, 12, 21, 23, 29, 38 and 43 - so I would have missed out by one number (43 was actually a supplementary number). If you've followed my blog from the start you'd remember that my guides are often mischievous like this. (Trust me, I'm a blogger)

The only interesting numerical feature I'm noting in all of this, and it is almost spooky enough to turn me to the magical side, is that I wrote yesterday's article on the 29th of the month. Number 29 was not only drawn in the real game but also featured in 3 of my sample draws.

• D: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7
  
• S: 29, 5, 13, 22, 25, 31, 45
  
• W: 19, 28, 7, 9, 15, 32, 45
  
• R: 17, 23, 30, 34, 29, 1, 15
  
• P: 2, 11, 17, 22, 25, 29, 43

No other number was drawn three times in these samples - but quite a few feature twice (1, 2, 5, 15, 17, 22, 25, 45).

All in all, it was a waste of effort. Hope you enjoyed it.


UPDATE:

There were only two winners, that's seemingly less than statistical chance so it would appear no mystical forces were at play tonight.

So, where does this leave astrology, numerology & psychic-ness?

• Astrology: with just two winners from an estimated 10 million participants, I'm going out on a limb and assuming that a lot of people born in any of the six months Black listed as positive, didn't win. In fact, less than one per cent of players got as much as a fifth division prize and only 24% got the lowest prize available. Not a great result given around 50% of players would have been born in the "good" months.
  
• Numerology: contrary to Black's claim, the number 30 was not significant and nor were "values of three". People following this advice would have lost badly, even if they'd spent over $12,000 covering all possible combinations.
• Psychic-ness: Black saw that the prize would obviously go off but that wasn't psychic so much as a matter of statistics. With more people than ever before entering, five people could have won without the result appearing unusual. What's really surprising, if anything, is that ONLY two people won.