The ultimate gambling math

There are always arguments between those who believe that math controls the long-term outcome of casino games and those who believe something else controls the nature of these games. These "something else's" can be trends, psychic intuitions, psychokinesis and fervent hope, among others.

The fact is that no one has looked into the depths of gambling the way I am about to. Dear readers, you are about to take a trip into the most advanced cross-discipline mathematical analysis of casino games -- craps in particular -- ever devised, and this trip combines logic and consciousness in a way never thought of before -- except, right now, by me. It is the melding of the arcane and the arithmetic, and that is some combination.

Why not just say "wow!" in advance, because your jaws are about to drop in awe with what I am about to write.

Here is the key mathematical concept you must learn: The concept of zero or zed or nothing, also meaning zip as in "nothing has happened up to now." If you can conceptualize this "nothingness" you will realize the true nature of a casino game such as craps as you play that game.

Let me lead you by example: You have put a place bet of $30 on the number 6. There are five ways that the 6 can show, winning the bet for you, and six ways that the 7 can show, thereby losing the bet for you. So you are looking at 11 ways you can win or lose that bet. That's it. That is the game you are playing. The blackjack game has no influence on your game; the roulette game has no influence on your game; the baccarat game has no influence on your game. Nothing but the 6 or 7 at your table has anything to do with your game.

And nothing, NOTHING, else happening at your craps table has anything to do with your game which is, I repeat, rooting for the 6 to show and rooting against the 7 showing.

OK, let's get deeper into the example:

Now, a shooter is throwing the dice and he rolls a 4, then a 5, then an 8, then a 9. What has happened in your particular game? Nothing. Zip! Zero! Zed! Since neither the 6 nor the 7 were thrown, there has been (now follow this advanced math!) no game yet played by you. Those numbers that have been thrown could have been thrown on the table next to your table or the table next to that table or the casino next door or in another state or in another country or on Jupiter.

In short, when nothing happens that affects you then nothing has happened.

Now let's bring in our fragile minds, shall we? What does the human mind, your mind, my mind, tell you about the table that you are at? It doesn't act as if nothing happened; it acts nervous as if the 7 is closer to appearing now since some numbers have come up. You start to get antsy; nervous, your hands might start sweating. But all this mental and emotional reaction is sad because nothing has happened. The feeling that something has indeed happened could not be further from the truth. If all the numbers except 6 or 7 come up for the next hundred rolls, still nothing has happened. Your game has not been influenced at all.

How many craps players do you know who could stand at a table watching number after number after number -- numbers that they aren't on -- being thrown and not start to think: "Maybe I should bet on some of the other numbers because mine isn't hitting." If you play craps, can you be so cool as to understand that all those numbers have nothing to do with the game you are playing? Those other numbers could be hitting at another table -- they have, I repeat, nothing to do with your game.

I have been trying for years to fight the inclination of my fragile mind to learn this advanced mathematical formula, which is "when nothing is happening to my bets than nothing is happening to my game and everything else is also nothing." Put into a formula it goes: 0+0+0 = 0. For some reason this is the hardest mathematical formula I have ever tried to learn in my gambling life.

But I have learned it. Yes, it has taken me two decades to learn because it is the hardest mathematical construct in all of casino gambling.

An extension of this construct is this one. A friend of yours tells you about a great roll he was on at the casino while you were taking a nap or swimming in the pool. You might get a little depressed and say, "I wish I had been there," as if you missed out on something. But you missed out on nothing. Your friend didn't miss out on your swimming or your nap and you didn't miss out on the big roll he experienced.

Otherwise, you would have to feel bad every hour of every day for the rest of your life since right now, even as you read this, some craps shooter is having the roll of a lifetime.

There is a mathematical formula for this as well. In English first: "If you aren't there it is the equivalent of a tree falling in the forest with no one to hear it and even if you hear about it then it still makes no difference because you weren't there. A past event can't be experienced by you, so nothing happened." This is 0+0+0+0+0 = 0.

OK, so right now, start learning the nature of zero because it will help your bankroll, your psyche and your emotional wellbeing. Unless it happens to you, then nothing has happened at all.