The Lottery
I work with a guy who is very anti-gambling and pretty "Christian." Today he had bet an imaginary $5 (because real money would be gambling) that nobody would know the answer to some question without looking it up[1]. At the end of his contest he "jokingly" offered me his five mythical dollars to shut up (I was being mildly annoying). This of course led to a behind his back conversation in which we joked about him considering the lottery the greatest of all sins[2], since he had previously gone off during a team lunch about its evils.
Oddly, I have to agree with him partially here. The lottery is a sin against one of the highest powers in the universe. Mathematics. Of course we differ in that I think anyone should be allowed to commit that sin. Which brings me to my next idea. States that are thinking about having a state run lottery (because if the state does it it isn't gambling, unlike poker) should invest a portion of the profit into education programs to teach people the math behind the lottery and how impossibly improbable it is for them to win. I feel better about this than the money the cigarette companies shell out on anti-smoking campaigns because it isn't a company, but rather the government. Any thoughts?
[1] Google has ruined reward based trivia contests, just ask the radio stations. They've now moved on to the dangerous world of drinking contests.
[2] In Christian-dom I think analytical thought is considered the greatest sin…
Leave a Reply