Thursday, January 14, 2016

Someone actually won the $1.4 billion dollar lottery.  It's quite amazing, considering the odds. 

You know how it works, don't you? If it was just one number you had to pick from 1 to 45, the odds would be 1 in 45. But, if it's 2 numbers, then it jumps to 45 x 44 = 1 chance in 1980.

Look how much harder it is to get 2 right than 1. 

And so it is with Doorman because there are 2 separate, distinct, and totally unrelated issues: How did the man look? And how was he dressed? And the likeness we have been Oswald and Doorman is that they looked strikingly the same, and at the same time, they were dressed strikingly the same.


Are we to believe that Oswald and Lovelady not only looked that much alike but dressed that much alike? That, just by chance, that morning they got up and put on essentially the same outfit? And wore it the exact same way, with the long-sleeved shirt unbuttoned and sprawled open? And with a t-shirt with the same low-neck?

But wait. The t-shirt is a totally different variable because it is a totally separate and independent object. So, the t-shirt being the same unusual form is like getting another lottery number right. Do you know what the odds are of picking 3 correct lottery numbers? They are 45 x 44 x 43 = 1 in 85,140.



And that is why saying that those two are NOT the same man is mathematical insanity. Saying "Pay no attention to the likeness of the two images" is profoundly worse than the famous "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain."



But, this is 2016, an age of science and technology, a time when knowledge and information are available at the speed of the internet. And yet, people are willing to ignore the mathematical probability that is involved in this?



When I heard about the $1.4 billion dollar lottery, I bought a couple tickets just for the heck of it- when I was paying for gas. It was just for fun. No fuss/no muss. But, a lot of people who live in Nevada drove to California and waited on long lines in the desert just to buy lottery tickets. Now that was insane, considering the odds. 

But, the people who are denying the match between Oswald and Doorman are just like those people in ignoring mathematical reality, in engaging in not just self-delusion, but group-delusion. And the purpose of the delusion is not the scant hope of getting rich, but rather, of evading the truth about the murder of President Kennedy.

Well, you can run from the truth, but you can't hide from it. Lee Harvey Oswald did not murder President Kennedy because he was standing in the doorway when it happened. Lee Harvey Oswald and Billy Lovelady were not twins and they were not dressed the same. And, about that, there is mathematical, scientific, and historical certainty.    

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