Posted: Jul 07, 2012 4:29 am
Ah, I think I have it.
The chance of GGGGGG is one in 64.
The chance of BBBGGG is also one in 64.
The chance of BGBBGB is also one in 64.
There are 64 possible sequences, so "any possible sequence of six births is as likely as any other." as he says.
Since it is a book about how we think, I should look further into how I found that so hard. I seized on the rarity of GGGGGG, and clumped the mixed-sex birth orders (to my credit, only into different sex-ratio clumps, not one big clump), when the rarity of each of the birth-orders was what was to be contrasted with GGGGGGG, not the relative frequency of different ratios.
And thanks for the compliment, Igor.
The chance of GGGGGG is one in 64.
The chance of BBBGGG is also one in 64.
The chance of BGBBGB is also one in 64.
There are 64 possible sequences, so "any possible sequence of six births is as likely as any other." as he says.
Since it is a book about how we think, I should look further into how I found that so hard. I seized on the rarity of GGGGGG, and clumped the mixed-sex birth orders (to my credit, only into different sex-ratio clumps, not one big clump), when the rarity of each of the birth-orders was what was to be contrasted with GGGGGGG, not the relative frequency of different ratios.
And thanks for the compliment, Igor.