With the Powerball ballooning to $650 million after Wednesday’s drawing, hopeful players have been asking, is winning the lottery a matter of luck or something that science and artificial intelligence can predict?
Three students at the University of Salento in southern Italy say that science wins out.
They say they used AI to analyze patterns from past draws to predict future winning numbers. Their experimental approach resulted in a €43,000 jackpot in April, which now has people wondering if you can use science to win games of chance.
So did AI actually predict that outcome?
The students say using two years’ worth of lottery data and focusing on recurring number patterns rather than attempting to forecast random draws lead to a successful lottery win.
“Our model didn’t seek to predict the impossible but rather to identify the most frequently drawn numbers,” Marco Rossi told MSN. This a big departure from traditional gambling strategies that often bank on “rare” numbers, hypothesizing that there will be a statistical balance over time.
Helpfully, they got a tip from Diego Manca, a local betting shop owner, SiGMA World reports.
“The three of them came to me just under a month ago asking for information about ‘late’ numbers. They wanted to know whether, in my experience, it was better to bet on numbers that hadn’t been drawn for a long time,” Manca reportedly said.
“I suggested that, based on my experience, it might be more profitable to bet on numbers that are drawn most frequently on a given wheel,” he said. “They took my advice into account and developed a mathematical system based on it.”
Is the lottery really random?
Naturally, the idea of predicting lottery numbers ahead of time and with scientific accuracy would shake all accepted theories of randomness
“Like rolling dice, each draw is supposed to be independent,” Frédéric Giroire, a mathematician with the French National Centre for Scientific Research, said. “Past results shouldn’t influence future outcomes.”
That has long meant that the probability of any number repeating is unlikely to appear predictably no matter how many times is has come up before.
But there could be very real differences in the actual lottery process, such as in the equipment used, which could help predictions. Something as simple as lottery balls that may be physically different or arranged differently could change the outcome. That might be a way for AI to very quickly find differences that a human might not, and give one theory more likelihood to succeed than another.
“Subtle irregularities—such as a heavier ball or imperfect mixing—might exist,” Giroire said. “If AI detects flaws in the draw mechanism, that could be more significant than claiming it can predict numbers.”
So can AI really predict Powerball numbers?
While AI can analyze patterns and make predictions in many areas, accurately predicting Powerball numbers likely remains impossible. Here’s why:
- Questionable software: While there are some platforms that say they can predict Powerball results, the National Council on Problem Gambling, “such systems are unproven and often deceptive, promoting false hope and problematic gambling behavior.”
- Pattern absence: Lottery draws are supposed to be independent of patterns. The American Gaming Association says that “lottery numbers are generated to prevent patterns or predictability,” which therefore means “the outcome of each draw is entirely random.”
- Randomness: Powerball is explicitly designed to be a random process. According to the Multi-State Lottery Association, each drawing involves a random selection of six numbers, with all outcomes having equal probability. This means that “past results have no influence on future outcomes,” as mathematician and statistician William Feller noted in his book, An Introduction to Probability Theory.
Stay safe out there
Still, despite all the hullabaloo, experts have been quick to caution that this so far has been a one-off win.
“No detailed methodology has been disclosed,” Laura Wozniak, a statistician at MIT, told MSN. “The results could merely be luck—favorable coincidences that don’t hold up over time.”
For a breakthrough to be credible, a theory would have to be tested repeatedly under controlled conditions, with transparent protocols and consistent results. That means that the best approach to the lottery is to treat it as a game of complete and total chance. No model or algorithm can reliably predict the random outcome of a Powerball draw—yet.
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