A university project explaining a phenomenon of a coin tossing game called Penney Ante.

Penney Ante is a coin tossing game invented in 1969 by a mathematician called Walter Penney. It is played by two players. Each player selects a pattern of three heads and tails. The two patterns must be different. The players then flip a fair coin repeatedly until one of the patterns appears. The winner is a person whose pattern appears first.

Although initially the game appears to be fair, it is not in general. There is no best pattern that beats all others. The best we can do is let our opponent go first and then choose the best possible option that beats his particular pattern. To do so we need to be able to define relations between each two patterns. And this is where the fun begins.

To run the project use PenneyAnte.nb
Open .nb files using Mathematica. You can also use CDF Player but in this case .nb files will not function interactively.

See wiki for a full project description.

Project Samples

Project Activity

See All Activity >

Categories

Education

License

GNU General Public License version 2.0 (GPLv2)

Follow Penney Ante

Penney Ante Web Site

Other Useful Business Software
$300 Free Credits for Your Google Cloud Projects Icon
$300 Free Credits for Your Google Cloud Projects

Start building on Google Cloud with $300 in free credits. No commitment, no credit card required until you're ready to scale.

Launch your next project with $300 in free Google Cloud credits—no strings attached. Test, build, and deploy without risk. Use your credits across the entire Google Cloud platform to find what works best for your needs. After your credits are used, continue with always-free tier services. Only pay when you're ready to scale. Sign up in minutes and start exploring.
Start Free Trial
Rate This Project
Login To Rate This Project

User Reviews

Be the first to post a review of Penney Ante!

Additional Project Details

Languages

English

Programming Language

Mathematica

Related Categories

Mathematica Education Software

Registered

2013-01-17