Extreme value theory and the St. Petersburg paradox in the failure statistics of wires

The fracture stress of materials typically depends on the samplesize and is traditionally explained in terms of extreme value statistics. A recentwork reported results on the carrying capacity of long polyamide and polyesterwires and interpret the results in terms of a probabilistic argument known asthe St. Petersburg paradox. Here, we show that the same results can be betterexplained in terms of extreme value statistics. We also discuss the relevance ofrate dependent effects.