Estimating the Value of Pi with a Dartboard and (Not so Much) Luck!
summary
Uniform random throws over a square-inscribed circle yield an unbiased Monte Carlo estimate for pi given by 4·(inside)/n, implemented in two lines of NumPy and empirically producing a Gaussian-like spread (CLT). A large-deviation bound gives sample counts: ~1/epsilon^2 scaling, concretely 2,000 (ε=0.1), 200,000 (ε=0.01), 20,000,000 (ε=0.001). Allowing a larger surrounding square multiplies samples by H^2, and the empirical runs match the predicted error-sample tradeoff.
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chapters (6)
- 0:00Start
- 0:15What the game of darts is supposed to look like...
- 1:10A comparison of area
- 2:03Algorithm v1
- 3:20Aside: Monte-Carlo Integration
- 4:04How accurate is this algorithm?
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