Number 12

In New York Lotto under the 6/59 + 1/55 · Jan 2010 – Oct 2010 rules — 83 draws, 6 from 1–59 (an earlier era).

9times drawn · chance expected 8 +0.20σ

3draws waiting · a wait this long: 81% for any number

8.9average wait between appearances · chance says 9.8

24longest completed wait · 51% chance of one at least that long

12 is drawn as often as chance explains

Drawn 9 times in 83 draws against 8.4 expected, +0.20σ. Each draw is independent: after 3 draws away it is exactly as likely tonight as a number drawn yesterday.

Number 12, draw by draw

Drawn 9 times in 83 draws · average wait 8.9 draws · longest completed wait 24 · waiting 3 draws now

a completed wait — darker is longer the wait still running — a lower bound, not a finished gap

Where it lands in a sorted draw

Sort a draw and 12 has a favourite seat — chance gives a small number the low positions more often. That is the shape of sorting, not of the machine.

1st smallest3 · chance 3.0
2nd smallest4 · chance 3.9
3rd smallest2 · chance 1.8
4th smallest0 · chance 0.4
5th smallest0 · chance 0.0
6th smallest0 · chance 0.0

Every position’s lane →

The company it keeps

Seen most often with these — chance gives every partner about 0.8 shared draws, and the leaders are simply the ones that came out ahead this time.

29 52 8 9 27 34

Never drawn alongside 25 of the other 58 numbers; chance expects about 27 such strangers by now. Every pair →

How many people play it

Under the crowd model, 12 is picked about 1.34× as often as an indifferent choice — 6th most popular of 59. That changes nothing about whether it comes up, and everything about how many ways a jackpot on it would be shared.

Numbers 1–31 — the birthday zone ×1.22
Numbers 1–12 — day and month overlap ×1.10

The model and its sources → · What people believe about 12 →

Every draw it appeared in

Date	Wait	Position	The draw
2010-10-06	12	1st	12 28 34 45 46 56
2010-08-25	8	2nd	9 12 26 49 52 55
2010-07-28	1	3rd	3 8 12 15 31 51

What this cannot tell you

Nothing here predicts the next draw. A number’s history is a record of a fair machine’s past, and the machine keeps none of it: 12 is drawn with probability 6/59 tonight whatever it did last week.