[pa3lsvt]

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can any of you math gurus actually believe in god???

i mean religion is really just a bunch of people fighting over who has the best imaginary friend.

can god control variance now???

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Math guru. Believe in God. Here's my take (not that it is necessarily correct or anyone's beliefs aren't):

- God is variance (a subset of "God is everything"). Random events are randomly distributed across a normal distribution because that was God's intention. Nothing is pre-ordained and God didn't set the sample distribution to favor Yang when he needed it.

- Some people's faith allows them to believe that God does actively watch over them (and change the "randomness" of a deck of cards). I believe that this is a misapplication of faith - just ask Job how bad things can get for good faithful people. God's reward to the faithful is in the afterlife based on the goodness of your life as lived; it is not winning more than 20% of your 80/20s.

- People have free will. Yang prayed to God to help him make the correct decisions, and if God gave Yang help to call with A9 he was still free to fold.

- If you eschew God while playing poker (cheating or berating fish are good examples of this), that's bad. If you play poker but still act in a faithful manner then God is OK with that.

- Belief in one specific God doesn't mean that other's God(s) are wrong, bad, etc. Belief that you are superior because your God is better than other's God(s) (or lack of belief in God) is a sin. Most likely we are all wrong, or accidentally correct when we are correct. Along the same lines of "Evil performed in the name of God is still evil, and good performed not in the name of God will still be rewarded."

DISCLAIMER: Not meant to start a God debate. Keep your beliefs (or lack of belief). Just because I believe something different doesn't mean I think you are wrong or have any interest in convincing you that I'm right.