What is Gambler’s fallacy?

Gambler’s fallacy is when people think that past events affect future chances, even though they don’t.

Imagine you’re flipping a coin. It lands on heads three times in a row. You might think, “It has to be tails next!” But the coin doesn’t remember what happened before, it still has a 50-50 chance of landing on either side.

People sometimes act like coins (or dice) are fair, meaning each outcome is equally likely. But when something happens over and over, it feels like it "should" change soon. It’s like thinking your favorite toy will stop working just because it worked really well all day.

Think of a dice game at a fair. You roll the dice and get a 6, great! You think you’ll get another 6 because that one was so lucky. But actually, the dice don’t care about luck, each number still has an equal chance every time.

Gambler’s fallacy is like pretending the world is trying to balance things out when it really isn’t.