fromwww.scientificamerican.com
4 months agoHow the Math of Shuffling Cards Almost Brought Down an Online Poker Empire
If you've ever shuffled a deck of playing cards, you've most likely created a unique deck. That is, you're probably the only person who has ever arranged the cards in precisely that order. Although this claim sounds incredible, it's a great illustration of how quickly large numbers can creep into everyday situationswith occasionally challenging consequences, as the developers of an online poker game painfully discovered in the late 1990s.