I threw a coin n times, and never got three tails in a row. I calculated the odds of this event, and found out they were just about even; 50%-50%. How many times did I throw the coin?

A second question: what were the chances of having not gotten three heads in a row either?

(In reply to Technically Speaking by Jeremiah)

If you toss a coin twice, the probability is zero -- not 50% or even odds -- that you would get 3 tails in a row. 

The idea was to show how many times you would want to toss the coin so that beforehand it's just as likely as not that during the course of the sequence three tails in a row would have happened.

Posted by Charlie on 2004-06-14 22:39:15