Resolving the impossible lottery

In a previous post, I have posed a question which seems to admit of two contradictory explanations. Go read that post before this one or this post won't make a whole lot of sense!

Apologies for my absence!

I must apologise to my reader (singular intentional) for being absent from blogging for so long. And of course I've left a puzzle hanging, with my explanation of the impossible lottery puzzle.

I've been distracted by the acquisition of an iPad, a birthday, a trip abroad and various computer games (especially Supreme Commander 2 which I have recently discovered I quite like). The Steam Summer Sale has also been reminding me how much I love games.

I'm not sure my enthusiasm for this blog will ever quite get back to the levels it had before this hiatus, but I do intend to write at least a few more posts. Let's see how it goes!

Coincidences surprising and inevitable

Kitler photographed by Amy Halligan

Why is it that we might have no problem suspending our disbelief when watching a movie about an alien invasion, but we would find it ridiculous if the writers of a realistic soap opera suddenly started a storyline involving aliens?

This is actually a question that has interested me for some time, even if I seldom gave it much thought.

I will be getting back to the lottery paradox I posed in my last post, but first I have some things to say about the nature of coincidences and improbable events, and this is one of the questions I will attempt to answer.