Gambler's Fallacy

Discussion

One of our basic needs is for a sense of control, which we gain by seeking to predict the future and by attributing cause to events that occur. We also seek to win and avoid failure, which further drives us both to explain our losses outside ourselves and also to compensate for losses by trying to end up as a winner.

Habitual gamblers fall headlong into these traps. Many others are affected by it too. For example, 'Murphy's Law' (that when something goes wrong it will be the worst thing at the worst time) is often used to explain and provide comfort when things go wrong. Particularly for the gambler, it also means explaining winnings through external events and lucky charms (most of us prefer to explain winning through personal skills, although where chance is involved, we also fall into the trap). 'Luck' itself is an example, as it does not exist. What is random is random. The laws of statistics are all there are.

When things do go wrong and when our predictions fail, we need to be comforted in some way and the Gambler's Fallacy can be turned to this purpose also. We can explain failures as bad luck rather than incompetence or poor decision-making. We can take comfort in the fact that lady luck has gone out for the evening and there was nothing we could have done to change things.

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Gambler's Fallacy

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