Probability, Paradox, and the Reasonable Person Principle
The hand-wavy way I've always thought about the Monty Hall problem is as follows:<p>When the contestant picked a box he was making a random choice between three boxes and had a probability of 1/3 of picking the car. The probability that one of the other two boxes was the car is thus 2/3. When Monty Hall opens a box it's still the case that the probability of the car being in the other two is 2/3 but the contestant can now eliminate the open box and knows that the probability that the car is in the other box is 2/3. Thus it's worth switching.