Catholicism and Fish

[malorum]

It is my understanding that the devote Catholic poker pro should make use of pokertracker to steer clear of games that are too soft.

I refer to condition four of OK gambling in the Catholic encyclopedia and elsewhere:

[ QUOTE ]
Finally, there must be some sort of equality between the parties to make the contract equitable; it would be unfair for a combination of two expert whist players to take the money of a couple of mere novices at the game.

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[yukoncpa]

Sounds like Catholics are saying it's wrong to collude.

edit: If they were inexpert and colluding, that might be ok.

[malorum]

it mentions "two expert" vs. "a couple of novices"

Not two experts vs. one novice.

The concept discussed is the lack of equity in terms of skill.

[bobman0330]

The edge of an expert poker player over a novice poker player is much smaller than that of an expert whist player over a novice.

[Peter666]

I think Yukoncpa is correct in regards to colluders.

The element of luck nullifies the moral aspect of taking away money from a novice player. Any novice can sit down with an expert and win.

Now if you were conspiring a plan for you and your expert friends to pick on one novice and suck all his possessions away from him, that might be problematic. But at the same time the novice will become a better poker player with all this experience.

We can compare Andy Beal playing against the pros.

Morally, if we knowingly have the ability to make a player totally destitute and make his family suffer, we should not play against him. But the reality is almost always different.

[yukoncpa]

[ QUOTE ]
The edge of an expert poker player over a novice poker player is much smaller than that of an expert whist player over a novice

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If this is correct, then Bobman’s reply makes a lot of sense. An expert pool player, hanging out in a bar and pretending to be bad in front of some good ‘ol boy drunks, intuitively knows he’s doing something wrong when he propositions them to some friendly games.
An expert nine-ball player can run several racks, where a novice could spend a week and not run one rack. An expert poker player can study his heart out and still run into blistering bad luck day after day.
From the reply’s of some of the posters here on 2+2, they seem to feel that they are doing something wrong by taking advantage of poor poker players. I believe they are misguided and making an incorrect analogy, but if this is how they feel, then maybe they shouldn’t play poker. I can honestly say that I don’t , at all, feel any guilt when I sit down at a poker table. Instead, I feel happy and can’t wait to have a chat with the guys.

[Meromorphic]

[ QUOTE ]
It is my understanding that the devote Catholic poker pro should make use of pokertracker to steer clear of games that are too soft.

I refer to condition four of OK gambling in the Catholic encyclopedia and elsewhere:

[ QUOTE ]
Finally, there must be some sort of equality between the parties to make the contract equitable; it would be unfair for a combination of two expert whist players to take the money of a couple of mere novices at the game.

[/ QUOTE ]

[/ QUOTE ]

Even if the inexperts sit down with the full knowledge that they're playing experts and that there is a large skill gap?