[mycroft]

I think I recognize this hand from another thread. If I do, it was from the Vanderbilt, which is a ACBL Superchart event.

The relevant DISALLOWED section for that event would be "2. Psyching of artificial opening bids and/or conventional responses thereto." - with no reference to conventional responses to natural calls.

If the TD decided that 1♦ was natural as far as this is concerned, then everything's fine. I'm not sure I agree with that, and would have asked to discuss this with the DIC of the event - or "I do not believe that 1♦ was a natural call, and I'm unsure if it is allowed to be psyched. Could we see the regulation, please?"

[aguahombre]

The Mid and Super charts do not redefine "natural", so if that was the TD's determination, he was in error.

[nige1]

Prof Roy Meadow inappropriately quoted raw research. This exaggerated the statistical evidence against a mother accused of killing her children. Although Meadow overstepped his area of medical expertise, other expert witnesses did not rate his evidence "serious professional misconduct" (the intial verdict to the GMC). The statistical argument is complex as Richard Webster explains in Roy Meadow and "Cot death" statistics
Anyway, it seems to me that two sudden infant deaths in the same family are unlikely to be a chance coincidence. And two complementary psyches on the same board are unlikely to have happened by chance. As I understand the EBU position, such an occurrence, if sufficiently suspicious, can justify the director imposing a penalty. IMO, that rule should be enshrined in TFLB; and life is too short just to rely on a Recorder system

[barmar]

 nige1, on 2013-March-28, 13:38, said:

Anyway, it seems to me that two sudden infant deaths in the same family are unlikely to be a chance coincidence. And two complementary psyches on the same board are unlikely to have happened by chance. As I understand the EBU position, such an occurrence, if sufficiently suspicious, can justify the director imposing a penalty. IMO, that rule should be enshrined in TFLB; and life is too short just to rely on a Recorder system

In the cast of SIDS, what the courts failed to understand at the time was that even though they're an unlikely coincidence, murder is not the only likely common cause -- a genetic predisposition to crib death is another reasonable explanation (although if either child were adopted, this would be unlikely).

Similarly, complementary psyches on a board could be due to collusion, or it could also be because both players recognized the situation as a good time to psyche. The fact that they came to the same conclusion reflects how good the partnership is -- they're often on the same page. It's hard to know when "similar judgement" crosses the line to alertable partnership understandings.

[Vampyr]

 nige1, on 2013-March-28, 13:38, said:

Anyway, it seems to me that two sudden infant deaths in the same family are unlikely to be a chance coincidence.

Well, there may be an underlying factor; as mentioned by another poster, the causes of SID are poorly understood.

I think that the article missed one important point, which is that the longest odds against the second infant death can be no longer than the odds of the first. If the a priori probability of the two children being girls is 25%, once the first girl is born the probability is 50% (and in fact most likely slightly higher).

Similarly, the authors gave an example of a person winning the lottery at odds of 60million against. The same odds apply to her winning a second time (assuming her ticket-buying habits do not change very much). The second win does not suddenly have odds of 60million² against.

[Vampyr]

 barmar, on 2013-March-29, 10:24, said:

It's hard to know when "similar judgement" crosses the line to alertable partnership understandings.

Come back Rule of Coincidence. All is forgiven.

[bluejak]

 mjj29, on 2013-March-26, 11:57, said:

Well, in the EBU we'd definitely be looking at this since we have a regulation that says if both players psych on the same board it's at least Amber. This won't immediately cause a score adjustment, but any other suspicious events could cause it to be upgraded and I would be talking very seriously with the players to ask them what was going on. The result of this could lead me to rule it as an implicit understanding and adjust accordingly.

As someone else has pointed out, the regulation does not say it is at least Amber, just that it usually is, ie it is something worth looking at carefully. But don't confuse that with the idea that something unfair has happened: coincidences occur.

 nige1, on 2013-March-28, 13:38, said:

Anyway, it seems to me that two sudden infant deaths in the same family are unlikely to be a chance coincidence.

That is the whole problem: people ignore the word "unlikely" and read it as "impossible". If there are two SID deaths it could be because of genetic problems, but it could be a coincidence.

 nige1, on 2013-March-28, 13:38, said:

And two complementary psyches on the same board are unlikely to have happened by chance.

Yet again, I agree they are unlikely, but that does not mean they do not happen.

 Vampyr, on 2013-March-29, 10:27, said:

Come back Rule of Coincidence. All is forgiven.

The sad thing is that the RoC is quite a good idea if used correctly. But, of course, it wasn't. Similar to the EBU approach of normally Amber, the RoC should say that if two events happen in juxtaposition that seem pretty unlikely, a serious investigation should be made rather than just assume it is coincidence. But that does not mean that coincidences do not occur nor that the conclusion of such investigation should not be "no worries".



Many years ago, in New York, a man got into a car, and was pretty speedily arrested by the police and charged with stealing it. He protested his innocence, claiming it was his car.

The police investigated and found that it was not his car. However, they also found out that his car was parked a little further down the street, it was the same make and colour, the same key fitted both cars, and owing to an error on the part of the New York licensing authorities, it had the same registration number.

Now that's what I call a coincidence: and most people would call it anything from wildly unlikely to impossible. But it happened.