论文标题
蛇,梯子和不安,或数学家在休假期间所做的事情
Snakes and Ladders and Intransitivity, or what mathematicians do in their time off
论文作者
论文摘要
这篇娱乐性数学文章表明,蛇和梯子的游戏是不及物的:Square 69在79中取得了胜利的优势,而这反过来击败了73,击败了69。对游戏的分析是马尔可夫链,模拟的模拟,不同的sorts,尺寸和尺寸偏见的抽样的很好的例证。将其连接到“不及物骰子”,说明了名字的力量,以及与同事合作的乐趣。当抽签不计算时,我们显示了一个不及物骰子的最小例子,一个死亡只有一个“脸”,每个骰子都有两个脸。
This recreational mathematics article shows that the game of Snakes and Ladders is intransitive: square 69 has a winning edge over 79, which in turn beats 73, which beats 69. Analysis of the game is a nice illustration of Markov chains, simulations of different sorts, and size-biased sampling. Connecting this to "intransitive dice" illustrates the power of a name, and the joy of working with colleagues. When draws do not count, we show a minimal example of intransitive dice, with one die having just a single "face" and two dice each having two faces.