Here's the thing: if you don't play, you definitely can't win and your odds are zero. You can't win if you don't play.<p>I personally buy a single $2 lottery ticket about 2-3 times per month. I know I'm not going to win. But you know what I do? I spend at _least_ 30 minutes, if not the entire day, fantasizing about what I would do with the money.<p>Am I going to win? Not at all. But I think I now have a better idea of what my financial priorities are than I did before I started playing! I know what I'd do with my money if I won $1M, 2M, 5M, 10M, 25M, 50M, 100M, 250M, 500M, 1B... I know what I'd do with the money. And you know, I may never get to $1 billion, but given my current income and age, I will definitely hit the $1M and $2M marks, possibly the $5M point. And so knowing what I would do with that kind of money? That's pretty fun to think about.<p>In a world where my wife and I go to see Dune 2 in movie theaters and it costs $100, or in a world where a burrito can cost $15-20, or gas prices at $6+ per gallon, a $2 piece of entertainment with the tiny, infinitesimal chance of winning big seems eminently reasonable to me.<p>Now, if you're Bruno Mars and have a gambling problem, then maybe you should spend those $6/mo on something else.