[mrfredward]

There's an awesome introductory book on information theory which in one chapter resolves Maxwell's demon. The argument is that the energy needed to reliably send a single bit of information (which is needed for making the detector talk to the trap door) depends on the temperature of the fluid (because you have to overcome background noise), and it turns out the minimum energy needed for this communication is exactly equal to the amount that can be recovered from separating out a molecule.

If my understanding is correct (admittedly a big if), it seems the same problem applies to gambling. The energy it takes to communicate whether a gamble has paid off is at least as big as what can be recovered from the gamble.

The book is "An Introduction to Information Theory" by John R Pierce, and it's the most I've ever learned from a $10 paperback.