E812 -- Reflexions sur un espece singuliere de loterie, nommee Loterie Genoise
(Reflections on a singular kind of lottery named the Genoise Lottery)
Summary:
The Genoise lottery was the first number lottery, and as such drew much attention from 18th Century mathematicians.
Its chief expositors were Nicolas Bernoulli and Euler. Euler himself devoted at least five papers to the subject:
E338,
E412,
E600,
E813,
and this one. Here Euler determines the probability that a particular number be drawn.
It was read before the Academy of Berlin on March 10, 1763, but not published until 1862, in the Opera Postuma.
According to C. G. J. Jacobi, it was read to the Berlin Academy on March 10, 1763.
Publication:
-
Originally published in Opera Postuma 1, 1862, pp. 319-335
-
Opera Omnia: Series 1, Volume 7, pp. 466 - 494
Documents Available:
- Original publication: E812
- Richard Pulskamp has put together a fantastic page on Euler's Probability & Statistics,
including a lot of interesting background and historical work. The page includes a
translation of E812.
- Rob Bradley
of Adelphi Univeristy has written an excellent paper,
Euler and the Genoese Lottery
in which he examens a significant fraction of Euler's work on probability.
- Euler wrote four other papers on the Genoese lottery:
- E338, Sur la probabilte des sequences dans la lotterie Genoise
- E412, Solution d'une questione tres dificle dans le calcul des probabilites
- E600, Solutio quarundam quaestionum difficilorum in calculo probabilis
- E813, Analyse d'un probleme du calcul des probabilites
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