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InvisibleDiploidM
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Registered: 01/09/03
Posts: 19,274
Loc: Rabbit Hole
On Prayer, Superstition, and Slot Machines
    #15747227 - 02/01/12 12:50 PM (12 years, 1 month ago)

So this is a little long. I condensed it as much as I could without losing too much information entropy. Tell me what you think.

First some background:

Back in the 1930s, a guy named B. F. Skinner was investigating animal behavior when he got an idea. He put a pidgin in a box with a light, a lever and a chute that dispensed pidgin food. Using this box, Skinner tried different ways of training the bird to do various behaviors.

He'd turn on the light and wait for the bird to peck at the lever. Initially, the bird just sat there. But like all birds, it occasionally randomly pecked at things in the box, including sometimes the lever. When, by coincidence, he lite the light and the bird happened to peck the lever immediately after, he'd dispense a treat down the chute. Over time, the bird began to figure out that if it pecked when the light was on, it would get a treat. It didn't take long before Skinner had the bird pecking the lever on cue every time.

Next he tried variations on this theme. Instead of giving the bird a treat every time, he'd give the bird a treat randomly when it performed the correct behavior. Then he varied how often the bird got the treat. He eventually found that the fastest way to train an animal is to give it the treat when it performed the behavior but only treat randomly and not very often. So the animal has to perform the behavior many times to get the treat and it has no way to know ahead of time how many performances will be required for the next treat to dispense.

In summary, the fastest way to train an animal is to:

1. Randomly reward the correct behavior
2. Give small rewards
3. Give the reward rarely

Today, these principles are applied by theme parks, zoos, and circuses when their show animals are trained to perform tricks for an audience. And it's no coincidence that slot machines are set up EXACTLY like this. They jackpot small amounts, rarely, and at random intervals. Humans, who are animals after all, respond just like a bird in a Skinner Box.

On prayer:

Now here's something interesting. Although slot machines are deliberately designed with Skinner's research as the guiding principle, there is another human endeavor that also incorporates Skinner's research, but as a matter of happenstance, not by design. It's called prayer.

When people pray, sometimes they get what they asked for, sometimes they don't, and there's no way to know ahead of time. Sometimes grandma recovers from the stroke, other times she dies. That's criteria #1. When people pray for health or money to pay the mortgage, most of the time they don't recover from terminal cancer or win the lottery. The "rewards" are small. Their cancer lab results improve a little or they find a $20 on the ground. There are always the occasional outliers but this is generally the way it goes. There's criteria #2. Finally, most prayer goes unanswered. Of all the experiences I've had with people who pray (and every single thing I have ever prayed for), this has always been the case. The faithful attribute the frequent failures to "god's will". Go to any large church and listen to mass if you don't believe me. The priest will always pray for sick relatives of the congregation and most of the time, the ones who are seriously sick or old and near end of life die. That's #3.

This is why prayer is such a strongly self-reinforcing phenomenon, just like slot machines are. It incorporates all the critical components Skinner found to maximize animal training.

On Superstition:

Skinner tried one other interesting experiment. Instead of feeding the bird when it pecked on cue from the light, he fed it completely randomly. Sometimes it was when it pecked. Other times it was when it stood on one foot. Other times when it rotated to the right. Still other times when it flapped only it's left wing. Every reward was completely random.

The result was damned weird. Different birds began to develop a kind of superstition about what actually triggered the treat. It was different with each bird. Some examples were things like hopping on one foot. The treats were given completely randomly so no single behavior was being reinforced, but the birds somehow decided on their own that hopping on one foot was the key to getting a treat. Or rotating to the right. Skinner would leave these birds in the box for days using an automated mechanism to generate the random treats, then when he'd open the lid, he'd find the bird continuously spinning to the right like a top, or flapping one wing constantly, or some other bizarre behavior because it had developed an arbitrary "superstition" about what the key behavior was that got them the treat. But in reality, there was no key behavior. The treats were dispensed randomly.

So back to the slot machines, it's well known that many players develop similar superstitions. They think that twisting their fingers on the lever just so or wearing their "lucky blue shirt" or always facing East is the key to getting their treat. This theme repeats in such things as athletes who cross themselves or genuflect before a game, and bowlers or golfers or fishermen who have a lucky hat. It's also seen in things like Feng Shui where people arrange their furniture in certain ways thinking that it brings good luck.

Human delusion has no bounds. But maybe, if people understood how little in control of our own behavior we really are and how we form beliefs unsupported by objective evidence, we could start to use that knowledge to finally rise above our animal nature and create a world based on rationality and logic instead of the superstition and religion that have caused so much harm and held us back for so long.

What do you think about that?


--------------------
Republican Values:

1) You can't get married to your spouse who is the same sex as you.
2) You can't have an abortion no matter how much you don't want a child.
3) You can't have a certain plant in your possession or you'll get locked up with a rapist and a murderer.

4) We need a smaller, less-intrusive government.

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InvisibleOrgoneConclusion
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Registered: 04/01/07
Posts: 45,441
Loc: Under the C
Re: On Prayer, Superstition, and Slot Machines [Re: Diploid]
    #15747255 - 02/01/12 01:02 PM (12 years, 1 month ago)

So will a Hawaiian print shirt help me to win?

*tangent*

I actually know one full time professional slot player. No joke. There are banks of linked machines called progressives in which the jackpot inceases until hit. He has his favorites all picked out and visits them regularly to check on the jackpot. When the expected payout reaches 110% or more he calls in his team. They then lock up the bank of 6 or 8 machines and play the maximum for days until they hit. The players are regulary relieved by a second team. This is not for the casual player as you need a HUGE bankroll to do this, but he makes over $200,000 a year.


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InvisibleDiploidM
Cuban


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Registered: 01/09/03
Posts: 19,274
Loc: Rabbit Hole
Re: On Prayer, Superstition, and Slot Machines [Re: OrgoneConclusion]
    #15747287 - 02/01/12 01:10 PM (12 years, 1 month ago)

Why do the casinos let him do that? I thought they could kick someone out for any reason or no reason at all, including because they're lucky.


--------------------
Republican Values:

1) You can't get married to your spouse who is the same sex as you.
2) You can't have an abortion no matter how much you don't want a child.
3) You can't have a certain plant in your possession or you'll get locked up with a rapist and a murderer.

4) We need a smaller, less-intrusive government.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
InvisibleOrgoneConclusion
Blue Fish Group
Male User Gallery


Registered: 04/01/07
Posts: 45,441
Loc: Under the C
Re: On Prayer, Superstition, and Slot Machines [Re: Diploid]
    #15747352 - 02/01/12 01:24 PM (12 years, 1 month ago)

I don't know all the details but lets say 16 players on the team with 50 casinos to choose from with many smaller jackpots under the radar and it would be possible to hide for quite a long time.

Also, the casinos have ALREADY made their money on the progressives as it is factored in, so it costs them no more if the same people win more often or not. They only kick people out when they believe they are losing money.


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InvisibledeCypher
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Registered: 02/10/08
Posts: 56,232
Re: On Prayer, Superstition, and Slot Machines [Re: Diploid]
    #15748639 - 02/01/12 07:05 PM (12 years, 1 month ago)

Quote:

Diploid said:y
In summary, the fastest way to train an animal is to:

1. Randomly reward the correct behavior
2. Give small rewards
3. Give the reward rarely




I understand that random reinforcement produces the best results, but why small rewards?


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We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.

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Offline4896744
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Registered: 03/06/10
Posts: 5,128
Loc: United States
Last seen: 11 years, 10 months
Re: On Prayer, Superstition, and Slot Machines [Re: OrgoneConclusion]
    #15748660 - 02/01/12 07:08 PM (12 years, 1 month ago)

Quote:

OrgoneConclusion said:
So will a Hawaiian print shirt help me to win?

*tangent*

I actually know one full time professional slot player. No joke. There are banks of linked machines called progressives in which the jackpot inceases until hit. He has his favorites all picked out and visits them regularly to check on the jackpot. When the expected payout reaches 110% or more he calls in his team. They then lock up the bank of 6 or 8 machines and play the maximum for days until they hit. The players are regulary relieved by a second team. This is not for the casual player as you need a HUGE bankroll to do this, but he makes over $200,000 a year.




Damn, that's pretty cool.


--------------------
Live your Life! :heart:

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InvisibleDiploidM
Cuban


Folding@home Statistics
Registered: 01/09/03
Posts: 19,274
Loc: Rabbit Hole
Re: On Prayer, Superstition, and Slot Machines [Re: deCypher]
    #15748773 - 02/01/12 07:31 PM (12 years, 1 month ago)

but why small rewards?

If the reward isn't small, the animal becomes sated/bored and training progress slows. By keeping it small, it retains more of its motivating value.


--------------------
Republican Values:

1) You can't get married to your spouse who is the same sex as you.
2) You can't have an abortion no matter how much you don't want a child.
3) You can't have a certain plant in your possession or you'll get locked up with a rapist and a murderer.

4) We need a smaller, less-intrusive government.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
InvisibleOrgoneConclusion
Blue Fish Group
Male User Gallery


Registered: 04/01/07
Posts: 45,441
Loc: Under the C
Re: On Prayer, Superstition, and Slot Machines [Re: Diploid] * 1
    #15748960 - 02/01/12 08:06 PM (12 years, 1 month ago)

Sort of like pussy-whipping?


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