Why The Lottery Tricks You

You might have thought that the lottery is pretty cool, right? You only spend a speck of your money and can get more! And you have a big chance of winning the money because you get to choose more than 1 number, right? Well, that might be what most people think, but the lottery has a very special way of earning money. True, a very, very lucky person might win that pile of cash, but by that time, the lottery has got more than millions of dollars from people who don’t recognize what the lottery wants to do and what the lottery wants as an result. You might not be understanding this yet, but that is okay, just move on.

At first I thought that the lottery was a pretty good thing too. But today I wrote a Python program and I realized something:

# my Python program

import random

MyChoice=[12, 33, 4, 6, 46, 29, 50] 

balance = 1000  
moneyIWon = 0 
timesPlayed = 0 
while balance >= 5:
    timesPlayed += 1
    balance -= 5
    result = []
    while len(result) < 7:
        thisResult = random.randint(1, 50)
        if thisResult not in result:
            result.append(thisResult) 
    # print(result)
    myGuess = 0 # the guess you make
    for i in MyChoice: 
        if i in result:
            myGuess += 1

    if myGuess == 3: 
        balance += 5 
        moneyIWon += 5
        print("I won 5 dollars!")
    elif myGuess == 4: 
        balance += 20
        moneyIWon += 20
        print("I won 20 dollars!")

    elif myGuess == 5:
        balance += 106
        moneyIWon += 106
        print("I won 106 dollars!")

    elif myGuess == 6:
        balance += 5351
        moneyIWon += 5351
        print("I won 5351 dollars!")

    elif myGuess == 7:
        balance += 70000000 # total money you can win!
        moneyIWon += 70000000
        print("I won 70000000 dollars! Oh, my!")
        break # take a break :)


print('I tried',timesPlayed,'times, spent',timesPlayed*5,'dollars and the money I have left is', balance, 'dollars.')
print('I got', moneyIWon, 'dollars by buying lottery tickets, but my profit was spent.')

# *if you don't understand check my next blog*

Now, I agree with you that my program is so many rows long and you must be like: “Um… What in the whole universe is happening, and all this program says is blahblahblah!” Now I need to talk about my topic, but check my next blog to have an explanation. Alright. Sound okay?

So, assuming that you understand this 50-ish lines of code, test this code. You should get something like this:

I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I tried 207 times, spent 1035 dollars and the money I have left is 0 dollars.
I got 35 dollars by buying lottery tickets, but my profit was spent.

Process finished with exit code 0

Or something like this…

I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I tried 217 times, spent 1085 dollars and the money I have left is 0 dollars.
I got 85 dollars by buying lottery tickets, but my profit was spent.

Process finished with exit code 0

You noticed that you are always left with 0 dollars. How sad. To have a bit more money to survive a day, you can get yourself a bit more money:

balance = 1000 

I copied a line of code. This code tells the money I have. I can change this variable, balance.

balance = 30000 # Thirty thousand. Is that okay?

My result is:

I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 106 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 106 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 106 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 20 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I won 5 dollars!
I tried 6449 times, spent 32245 dollars and the money I have left is 3 dollars.
I got 2248 dollars by buying lottery tickets. But this profit was spent. Oh, no!

Process finished with exit code 0

Don’t mind the hundred rows of I won 5 dollars!…

Yeah, you might survive with a couple dollars. Maybe. You can perhaps buy a really cheap and old flute, make people pay money to listen to music, get $50, sell the flute for $10, buy a loaf of bread, and buy a block of wood and pick wild berries and use a stick and the berry juice to write please help me, please donate and then build a new mansion. However, when will you get 30 000 dollars? With another lottery?

Do you understand why I think you should not trust the lottery? They only make it sound good, but in reality…

Also, what a waste of time.

Also, my lottery code will have a special name: Python Lottery. My next blog will be called that.