The Mathematical Guide To Finding An Optimal Festival Toilet

The elegance of mathematics for your least elegant moment.

Who needs to study pure mathematics when the world offers plenty of opportunities to test probabilities.The scenario is familiar: great festival, shitty toilets. How to choose the best one buried among thousands of bad options? Well, it’s worth watching the above video which explains the probabilistically optimum outcome to your bowel-beleaguered woes. The answer?

The video’s narrator, Dr. Ria Symonds of the University of Nottingham, explains,”the best thing to do is to look inside 37% of the toilets. After you hit the 37% tipping point you choose the first toilet after that’s better than anything that came before, for your best chance of finding the best toilet.”

There is also an extended video that works you through the entire proof if you’re even thinking of not taking up this advice.

Or, if you’re not the betting type and want an intrepid journalist’s evaluation of the best toilets to use in Berlin, you really should read here.

(Photograph: David Levene)