Chapter 8: Less and Less and Less Wrong Summary and Analysis

Haralabos "Bob" Voulgaris makes a million dollars a year betting on sports. He uses computer simulations and is genius at analyzing the data. His gambling career began in 1999 when he was a college senior. He took $80,000, his life savings at the time, and bet it on the Lakers to win the NBA championship. The Lakers weren't being picked by anyone and had had a bad year the season before. But Voulgaris had watched a lot of their games and liked what he saw. It was nip and tuck all the way, but the Lakers came out victorious and Voulgaris was half way to becoming a millionaire.

Successful gamblers and forecasters do not think in terms of no-lose bets and precise measurements. They think of probabilities. Voulgaris had thought all...