Dostoevsky was a genius. How come he allowed himself to become a gambler?

[Dostov]

I think it's odd that Dostoevsky, brilliant as he was, allowed himself to become a gambler and became heavily indebted as a result of money lost gambling. When I think of gamblers, specifically unsuccessful gamblers, I think of unintelligent people who can't grasp simple statistical concepts (ie: the house almost always wins). Why did he become a gambler, then? Did he understand that gambling was a pointless endeavor but gambled anyway, because he liked the thrill of it?

[Slovenly Old Man]

Well, I guess you'll want to re-assess your judgement of gambling and the causes which drive one to gamble .... I think it's clear, as you've pointed out, that gambling is not an indicator of intelligence

[Slovenly Old Man]

I'm currently reading The Adolescent, and I came across a passage on gambling.  Keep in mind that this is from the point of view of Arkady Dolgoroky, the novel's protagonist, not from Dostoevsky's point of view.  However, it perhaps provides us a hint of his feelings towards gambling...

 

At all these roulettes and gatherings I decidedly failed to aquire any kind of bearing: first I sit and reproach myself for my unnecessary softness and politeness, then suddenly I get up and commit some rudeness.  And meanwhile such blackguards, compared with me, managed to behave themselves there with astonishing bearing--and that was what infuriated me most of all, so that I lost my coolheadedness more and more.  I'll say straight out that, not only now, but then as well, this whole society--and even winning itself, if all be told--finally became repugnant and tormenting to me.  Decidedly tormenting.  Of course, I experienced an extreme pleasure, but that pleasure came by way of torment; all of it, that is, these people, the gambling, and above all, I myself there with them, semed terribly dirty to me.  "The moment I win, I'll spit on it all at once!" I said to myself each time, falling asleep at dawn in my lodgings after the nights gambling.  And then again this winning: take just the fact that I had no love of money at all.  That is, I'm not going to repeat the vile pronouncments usual in such explanations, that I gambled, say, for the sake of gambling, for the sensation, for the pleasure of risk, passion, and so on, and not at all for gain.  I needed money terribly, and though it was not my way, not my idea, somehow or other I still decided then, as an experiement, to try this way too.