Another take on 'LUCK'

 

I've been following Derek Muller's excellent science channel, Veritasium, on Youtube for several years, but I only just stumbled upon this video of his from 4 or 5 years ago on the role of 'LUCK' - in sports, and life. 

Just over 3 minutes in, he has a fascinating example of a mathematical simulation he ran of the competitive selection process for NASA astronaut training - which apparently demonstrates that, with even a very small element of 'luck' at play in the process, at least 80% of those finally selected (overcoming daunting odds of around 1,700-1!!) will have displaced more able candidates by virtue of that little bit of crucial luck.

He doesn't go into a lot of detail about his simulation. I suspect that it involved multiple 'elimination rounds', rather as with a knockout cup competition - which would tend to cumulatively exaggerate the impact of the participants' luck. Nevertheless, it is a striking example of how great an effect luck can have in competitive outcomes.

And he was only allowing a weighting of up to 5% for the 'luck' factor in his selection tests. I think in Fantasy Premier League.... it's probably at least 50%!

I hate it when people naively brag about their rank in the game. Your rank proves nothing about how smart or capable you are. You can't get into the top 100,000 or so without having a substantial amount of good luck. And statistics would suggest that the great majority of that top 100,000 are there mostly through luck (that 80/20 split comes up everywhere.....), at the expense of far more capable managers.