I was surprised to read in A Beautiful Mind (the original biography, that the movie was loosely based on) that probability was invented to analyze poker and other "parlour" games. I had just assumed that the theory came first, I guess!
There are 12 ways of getting AA (four possibilities out of the deck for the first card, times three possibilities for the second card). Same for KK.
For AK, there are 32 ways (eight possibilities for the first card, and four for the second).
So, overall there are only 56 combinations out of a possible 2652, meaning on any given hand we're 46:1 underdogs to get dealt one of these premium hands!
|