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Parrondo's paradox
Open accessAbstract
We introduce Parrondo's paradox that involves games of chance. We consider two fair gambling games, A and B, both of which can be made to have a losing expectation by changing a biasing parameter $\epsilon$. When the two games are played in any alternating order, a winning expectation is produced, even though A and B are now losing games when played individually. This strikingly counterintuitive result is a consequence of discretetime Markov chains and we develop a heuristic explanation of the phenomenon in terms of a Brownian ratchet model. As well as having possible applications in electronic signal processing, we suggest important applications in a wide range of physical processes, biological models, genetic models and sociological models. Its impact on stock market models is also an interesting open question.
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Gammaitoni, L., Hänggi, P., Jung, P., & Marchesoni, F. (1998) · Reviews of Modern Physics · doi:10.1103/revmodphys.70.223 · Cited by 5,443
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Kay, E. R., Leigh, D. A., & Zerbetto, F. (2007) · Angewandte Chemie International Edition · doi:10.1002/anie.200504313 · Cited by 2,609
Natural language based financial forecasting: a survey
Xing, F. Z., Cambria, E., & Welsch, R. E. (2018) · Artificial Intelligence Review · doi:10.1007/s10462-017-9588-9 · Cited by 398
New Paradoxical Games Based on Brownian Ratchets
Parrondo, J. M. R., Harmer, G. P., & Abbott, D. (2000) · Physical Review Letters · doi:10.1103/physrevlett.85.5226 · Cited by 261
Self-citationPosition-dependent and cooperative quantum Parrondo walks
Bulger, D., Freckleton, J., & Twamley, J. (2008) · New Journal of Physics · doi:10.1088/1367-2630/10/9/093014 · Cited by 20
Metadata
- Authors
- Abbott, D., & Harmer, G. P.
- Venue
- Statistical Science
- Publisher
- Institute of Mathematical Statistics
- Published
- 1999-05-01
- Volume
- 14
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 206-213
- ISSN
- 0883-4237 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2021176516
- Cited by
- 206
- References
- 1
- FWCI
- 8.56
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
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