Mrs H

As of the 23rd May 2022 this website is archived and will receive no further updates.

understandinguncertainty.org was produced by the Winton programme for the public understanding of risk based in the Statistical Laboratory in the University of Cambridge. The aim was to help improve the way that uncertainty and risk are discussed in society, and show how probability and statistics can be both useful and entertaining.

Many of the animations were produced using Flash and will no longer work.

I used to work in an office counting the change from Charity Boxes. One day, I saw a coin and thought it looked strange. It was a penny and the colour wasn’t the same as the others. I picked it up and it was a brand-new 1p from 1971, the year I was born. It had no scratches or dints n dings in it, it was as new. I was amazed, so I replaced it with a larger value coin and kept it for luck... Then one day without realising it, I scooped it up with a lot of other coppers and changed it where I worked for a bigger denomination, forgetting the coin was there. I realised I had lost it and be-moaned my carelessness. I obviously hadn’t looked after it properly, so it’s my own fault i’d lost it.... Cursing my ill-luck, I was counting a different charity box several months later and I thought that coin looks weird... As I picked it up, a voice in my mind said, look after it this time.... So I replaced it again and took it home and made sure I never lost it again... There where 7 cash tills and five charity boxes where I worked, but somehow that coin came to me, went back into the system and came back to me again... I’ve always lived by adage:- See a penny, pick it up All day long, you’ll have good luck. Pass it on, to a friend May this luck, never end....
Total votes: 334
Date submitted:Sat, 04 May 2019 06:15:26 +0000Coincidence ID:10255