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by kqr 290 days ago
Yet this article, like thousand others, don't go beyond binary decisions. Binary decisions are fine for many everyday decisions like figuring out whether to get insurance[1] but the Kelly criterion goes well beyond that[2] without changing the fundamentals: estimate a joint probability distribution of the outcome for each alternative, evaluate E(log X) using it, and pick the alternative for which it is highest.

For a deeper introduction, I recommend the somewhat heavy Kelly Capital Growth Investment Criterion[3] which is a well-curated collection of papers on the Kelly criterion and its various uses.

[1]: https://xkqr.org/insurance/?wealth=0&offered=0

[2]: https://entropicthoughts.com/the-misunderstood-kelly-criteri...

[3]: https://www.amazon.com/KELLY-CAPITAL-GROWTH-INVESTMENT-CRITE...