People are gazing with awe at the pot that had swollen to less than a quarter of a billion to hit one billion pesos in jackpot prize. The accumulated amount demonstrates the high stakes and the very low degree of probability of hitting the number combination that would come out as the winning number in the lotto draw. The number of combinations is a myriad that the chance of getting the right numbers is purely by a stroke of luck. People bet based on their gut feel or by plucking numbers out of nowhere, hoping and praying that the chosen combination will be it.

While there are mathematical formulas and procedures to determine the accurate number of combinations, there is no means to determine which among the combinations will be the best choice. Computing the number of permutations is mathematically determinate but identifying the winning number is simply beyond mathematical calculation or even approximation to solve.

With the prize swelling as huge as it is now, wonder not why for it truly what it is. Not even the multitude of people betting for so many number combinations had found the right combination. It is just that the lottery is under the dispensation of the present administration that run and got elected on a campaign of honesty. Taking over the agency on the premise of protecting its integrity is just apt to ensure the people that the lottery is truly a game of high stakes where chance of winning is as minutely infinitesimal as one can bet.

This brings us to take some flashbacks and consider wondering why and how it was not so under the past dispensation. The number of permutations had not changed and the format of the draw including the rules and mechanics remained as before. It was just that hitting the right combination was something too close as the pot registers mindboggling figures. Even lay people who bet on it are sold to the idea that as the pot breaks the hundreds millions levels, the probability of it being won become a probability.

The betting public know too well that the pot had not reached this big in recent years. It is truly by chance that the winning combination is hit and thus far, it has yet to happen. That is why we see long queues of those taking that chance of a lifetime to bet on their numbers with the hope that they might just hit the winning numbers. While the number of permutations could be too infinitesimal, the chance of hitting the right one is always a given probability that cannot be discounted.

Those who lived on chances by betting just on anything do not care much betting more. Others who are merely mesmerized by the hugeness of the pot are lured into picking what they thought are lucky numbers that might just come out in the lotto draws. We cannot blame people getting eager and excited at the expectancy of huge money coming their way by pure luck.

On hindsight, we may wonder how we never got this chance of a lifetime betting on so huge a pot as it had swollen to what it is now. We now gaze at the huge pot still up for grabs despite reaching record-breaking levels and just realize that the chance of winning is after all a function of luck and not of the hugeness of the pot.

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By: Al Ellema