Michael Orkin

The Mega Millions Lottery is a game of chance, no skill possible. It’s played in most states and offers multi-million-dollar jackpots. Despite employing various popular lottery strategies, like picking lucky numbers, birthdays, anniversaries, astrology numbers, numbers considered ‘hot,’ ‘cold’ numbers due for selection, and so on, there is no skill in buying a winning lottery ticket.

This is because lottery winners are determined by picking numbers at random. If you think the configuration of the planets or a pattern you saw in your oatmeal this morning has any effect on your chance of winning, you may have apophenia—the tendency to perceive a connection between unrelated or random things. The chance of winning the jackpot is so low, it’s almost guaranteed you will lose if you buy a ticket. However, this doesn’t mean everybody will lose.

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