Probabilities

[69dodge]

I was toying with this problem, and came up with numbers different from what DA offers. Can anyone explain where I'm going wrong?

I started with the assumption that the odds of getting at least one guess out of six right would be equal to 1 minus the odds of getting none right. To determine this, I figured:

The odds of getting the first guess wrong are 5/6, or 83%.

So far, so good.

Since there are now only five options to choose from, the odds of getting the second guess wrong are now 4/5, or 80%.

There are five options to choose from, but they might all be wrong, not just four of them, because the guesser might already have chosen, as his first guess, the correct answer to the second question. So it's more complicated.

And the subsequent guesses are yet more complicated.

 

[Rat]

I once had a friend select 4 out of about 7-8 single malts in my liquor cabinet. I got all 4 not knowing which 4 she had chosen. But it helped tremendously that these were mine, so I was very familiar with them.

Another time we tried a blind tasting of unflavored vodkas. It was a total failure - I think they all taste exactly the same (but I thought that before the test too).

If I was being mean, I might point out that your test was not properly blinded, but I guess that's not a bad result. If you have a few whisky-loving friends, though, it's a good way to spend an evening. Have everyone chip in to buy them, get ten or twelve very varied whiskies together, and have a non-participating person in another room pouring the drinks. Winner gets first choice of bottle to take home.

Personally I don't drink whisky because I don't like it (although even I can tell Laphroaig), but I do like vodka, and I do buy the more expensive ones, and they do taste different to me. But I wouldn't be even slightly surprised if I couldn't tell the difference when blinded. A huge part of taste is what you expect to taste.

 

[sol invictus]

If I was being mean, I might point out that your test was not properly blinded, but I guess that's not a bad result.

It wouldn't be mean at all, it would be correct. From experience I'm fully aware of how easy it is to convince yourself you can distinguish something, only to fail miserably blind! In this case it seemed fairly easy to distinguish, but perhaps my friend was helping somehow.

Personally I don't drink whisky because I don't like it (although even I can tell Laphroaig), but I do like vodka, and I do buy the more expensive ones, and they do taste different to me. But I wouldn't be even slightly surprised if I couldn't tell the difference when blinded. A huge part of taste is what you expect to taste.

Yep. And in the end, while it's interesting and relevant to know whether you can distinguish blind, it's not that important. Drinking whiskey isn't a profession, after all...

 

[Rat]

No, but it can save you a lot of money if you discover that you really can't tell the difference or, even better, if it turns out you really prefer the cheaper stuff. Or at least it would save money if you could convince your subconcious of that when you're not blinded.

 

[Soapy Sam]

I'm a beer and cider drinker by preference, no oeneophile at all, but on a visit to Beaune in Burgundy surprised myself and a wine buff friend by listing about 10-12 reds , blind, in correct order of price, with one small error: I got them exactly the wrong way round.
It seems I prefer cheap reds to expensive ones.
His comment was that I needed to learn to appreciate good stuff. My response was that would be crazy. Cheaper to stick to my preferences.

Last whisky tasting I went to, the first 3 were all Islay malts- Laphroaig, Lagavullin and my favourite, Bowmore. I got those, but then bogged in a morass of (to me) indistinguishable Speysides.
After a while, you stop caring...

 

[Ray Brady]

There are five options to choose from, but they might all be wrong, not just four of them, because the guesser might already have chosen, as his first guess, the correct answer to the second question. So it's more complicated.

Yes! Thank you!