Flipping a coin is a universal way to quickly solve small disagreements between two parties. E.g. you want pizza and I want Mexican, so let’s just flip a coin.

But why do we typically flip a fair coin? The  average coin flip gives each person a 50% probability of having their way, but that might not make sense.

Suppose one of the two parties has a much stronger preference, or a stronger argument — perhaps the stronger position shouldn’t automatically win, because that would ignore the other party’s valid preferences and arguments, even if they’re weaker.

Say I’m merely in the mood for a burrito but you are really craving pizza. By flipping an unfair coin that approximates our relative preferences we’re still letting chance take the wheel, but in a way that better aligns with the situation. Maybe we could flip a coin that has a 30% chance of landing on burrito but a 70% chance of landing on pizza.

Or say that in some disagreement we both have solid arguments for our position, but I admit your arguments are slightly stronger. I don’t want to fully concede, but I may be willing to flip a coin that gives your preferred outcome a 60% chance.

Of course we don’t have easy access to unfair physical coins, but anyone reading this blog most likely has a computer in their pocket that can do unfair coin flips easily.

Maybe this is a weird robotic way to interact with people when common sense fairness and communication will do, but for low stakes disagreements I think unfair coin flipping could be a time saving tool that leaves both parties feeling accounted for.