Reply #3: Maybe it would be educational. [View All]

When people cut corners in various ways, they justify their decisions on the grounds that the odds of a problem are low. How low is low and what are the consequences if they are wrong? An important point is that many people cut corners not just once in a lifetime. They cut corners many times.

Do people have a good intuition when it comes to determining whether or not various events are independent of each other?

Are they good at estimating the probability of an event that is defined in terms of a large number of other events?

Do the vast majority of people pay attention to the difference between various probabilities that are close to zero or does at least a small but significant fraction of the population classify a variety of quite different probabilities close to zero in a single category of events of "negligible" probability?