Make: More Electronics

Chapter 36. Experiment 36: The One-Person Paranormal Paradigm

Here’s the plan. There will be a single LED behind a screen. An electronic circuit will switch the LED on or off, and will then prompt the player to guess which state it is in—by using his psychic powers, if he is fortunate enough to possess them.

The player will press a righthand button if he thinks the LED is on, or a lefthand button if he thinks the LED is off. The circuit will tell him whether the guess was correct or incorrect, and the cycle will repeat.

I think we now have all the necessary knowledge to build this circuit. What we don’t have is a way to assess the results. How many correct guesses do you think a player needs to make, compared with his incorrect guesses, to achieve ...