I'm back! Tonight I did some of my probability math homework and it wasn't too horrible. The funny thing though is I sat down and was like okay math homework, prepare to be solved! I opened to my first question and got stumped on that one for almost 20 minutes! :( What a great start! I did eventually solve it, so no worries. I did find one question from my homework that very interesting and actually fun to do.
The question said I had a container with seven letters in it. The letters where TRACKED, yes I know they spell tracked. Now my math homework wanted me to find the probability of the outcome being TRACE, in that order, if I drew a letter one by one without replacing it. So, the probability of drawing the first letter in TRACE, if there are seven letters in the container, is 1 out of 7. After drawing the first letter and not replacing it, the probability of drawing the next letter correctly is 1 out of 6. As you continue the probability of drawing the third letter correctly is 1 out of 5, the fourth letter correctly 1 out of 4, and the fifth letter correctly 1 out of 3. After the fifth draw you stop because TRACE only has five letters in it. Each time you draw another letter, the sample space decreases by one. Once you have all of your probabilities, you multiple them together:
(1/7)(1/6)(1/5)(1/4)(1/3)
All that multiplication comes out to be 1 out of 2520, which is the probability of drawing TRACE. Pretty simple in the end but interesting if you really think it through.
That's all for today. Have a great Thursday everyone (at least it's almost Friday)! :)
Lauren
I remember that problem. I thought it was interesting too because it is basically the same method used to figure your odds of winning the lottery. I have only played the lottery a couple of times and after doing that math problem I feel the need to tell the "you can win if you don't play" people that my chances of winning are pretty much the same either way.
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