1.) What is Probability?

Probability is an area of mathematics which we use all the time in daily life and usually without
thinking about it. The probability of an event refers to the likelihood that the event will occur. It is the
chance that something will happen - how likely it is that some event will happen. Moreover, it is a way of
expressing knowledge or belief that an event will occur or has occurred.
Some key terms:
An experiment is a situation involving chance or probability that leads to results called outcomes.
An outcome is the result of a single trial of an experiment.
An event is one or more outcomes of an experiment.
Probability is the measure of how likely an event is.
In order to measure probabilities, mathematicians have devised the following formula for finding
the probability of an event:
P (A) = The Number Of Ways Event A Can Occur
The total number Of Possible Outcomes
Probability can be expressed as a fraction, a decimal, a percent, or as "odds". Mathematically, the
probability that an event will occur is expressed as a number between 0 and 1. In a statistical experiment,
the sum of probabilities for all possible outcomes is equal to one. This means, for example, that if an
experiment can have three possible outcomes (A, B, and C), then P (A) + P (B) + P(C) = 1.
What are the uses of Probability?
Even though we do not realize the use of mathematical probabilities in everyday life,
subconsciously we use it in every step that we take. Here are some common real life uses of probability:

Sports be it basketball or football and coin is tossed and both teams have 50/50 chances of
winning it, a basketball player takes a free throw judging his past performance it can be
determined if he will make it or not.
Board Games a game spinner with four sections, there is a 25% chance of it landing res, since
one of the 4 sections is red. Similarly the odds of rolling one die and getting and even number
there is a 50% chance since three of the six numbers on a die are even.
Medical Decisions When a patient is advised to undergo surgery, they often want to know the
success rate of the operation which is nothing but a probability rate. Based on the same the
patient takes a decision whether or not to go ahead with the same.
Life Expectancy this is based on the number of years the same groups of people have lived in
the past. These ages are used as guidelines by entities such as financial advisers to help clients
prepare for their retirement years. ehow.com
Weather when planning an outdoor activity, people generally check the probability of rain.
Meteorologists also predict the weather based on the patterns of the previous year, temperatures
and natural disasters are also predicted on probability and nothing is ever stated as a surety but a
possibility and an approximation.

2.) How do we generate events?

A. Independent events: When the outcome of the first event does not influence the outcome of the
second event.

When we determine the probability of two independent events we multiply the probability of the first event
by the probability of the second event.

Example: You toss a coin three times and it comes up "Heads" each time ... what is the chance that the
next toss will also be a "Head"?
The chance is simply 1/2, or 50%, just like ANY OTHER toss of the coin.
What it did in the past will not affect the current toss!

B. Dependent events: When the outcome of the first event influences the outcome of the second event.

The probability of two dependent events is the product of the probability of X and the probability of
Y AFTER X occurs.

Example: Drawing 2 Cards from a Deck

After taking one card from the deck there are less cards available, so the probabilities change!

Let's look at the chances of getting a King.

For the 1st card the chance of drawing a King is 4 out of 52
But for the 2nd card:
-If the 1st card was a King, then the 2nd card is less likely to be a King, as only 3 of the 51 cards left are
Kings.
-If the 1st card was not a King, then the 2nd card is slightly more likely to be a King, as 4 of the 51 cards
left are King.

4.) What is Conditional Probability?

The conditional probability of an event B in relationship to an event A is the probability that event
B occurs given that event A has already occurred. The notation for conditional probability is P(B|A), read
as the probability of B given A. The formula for conditional probability is:

The formula for the Conditional Probability of an event can be derived from Multiplication Rule 2 as
follows:
Multiplication Rule 2:

When two events, A and B, are dependent, the probability of

both occurring is:
Start with Multiplication Rule 2.
Divide both sides of equation by P(A).

Cancel P(A)s on right-hand side of equation.

Commute the equation.

We have derived the formula for conditional probability.

Example 1:

Solution:

P(White|Black)

A jar contains black and white marbles. Two

marbles are chosen without replacement. The
probability of selecting a black marble and then a
white marble is 0.34, and the probability of
selecting a black marble on the first draw is 0.47.
What is the probability of selecting a white marble
on the second draw, given that the first marble
drawn was black?
P(Black and White)
=
0.34
=
0.72
=
72%
P(Black)
0.47

Example
2:
Solution:

The probability that it is Friday and that a student is absent is 0.03. Since there are 5
school days in a week, the probability that it is Friday is 0.2. What is the probability that a
student is absent given that today is Friday?
P(Absent|
=
P(Friday and Absent)
=
0.03
=
0.15
=
15
P(Friday)
0.2
Friday)
%

3.) What is the combination of events? Give examples.

There are two types of combinations (remember the order does not matter now):

Repetition is Allowed: such as coins in your pocket (5,5,5,10,10)

No Repetition: such as lottery numbers (2,14,15,27,30,33)

A.) COMBINATIONS WITH REPETITIONS

OK, now we can tackle this one...

Let us say there are five flavors of icecream: banana, chocolate, lemon, strawberry and vanilla.
We can have three scoops. How many variations will there be?
Let's use letters for the flavors: {b, c, l, s, v}. Example selections include

{c, c, c} (3 scoops of chocolate)

{b, l, v} (one each of banana, lemon and vanilla)

{b, v, v} (one of banana, two of vanilla)

(And just to be clear: There are n=5 things to choose from, and we choose r=3 of them.
Order does not matter, and we can repeat!)

Now, I can't describe directly to you how to calculate this, but I can show you a special techniquethat
lets you work it out.

Think about the ice cream being in boxes, we could say "move past the first box, then take 3
scoops, then move along 3 more boxes to the end" and we will have 3 scoops of chocolate!
So it is like we are ordering a robot to get our ice cream, but it doesn't change anything, we still get what
we want.
We can write this down as

(arrow means move, circle means scoop).

In fact the three examples above can be written like this:

{c, c, c} (3 scoops of chocolate):
{b, l, v} (one each of banana, lemon and vanilla):
{b, v, v} (one of banana, two of vanilla):
OK, so instead of worrying about different flavors, we have a simpler question: "how many different ways
can we arrange arrows and circles?"
Notice that there are always 3 circles (3 scoops of ice cream) and 4 arrows (we need to move 4 times to
go from the 1st to 5th container).
So (being general here) there are r + (n1) positions, and we want to choose r of them to have circles.
This is like saying "we have r + (n1) pool balls and want to choose r of them". In other words it is now
like the pool balls question, but with slightly changed numbers. And we can write it like this (note: r+(n1)
is the same as n+r1):

where n is the number of things to choose from, and

we choose r of them
(Repetition allowed, order doesn't matter)
Interestingly, we can look at the arrows instead of the circles, and say "we have r + (n1)positions and
want to choose (n1) of them to have arrows", and the answer is the same:

So, what about our example, what is the answer?

(5+31)!
3!(51)!

7!
3!4!

5040
624

= 35

B.) COMBINATIONS WITHOUT REPETITIONS

This is how lotteries work. The numbers are drawn one at a time, and if we have the lucky numbers (no
matter what order) we win!
The easiest way to explain it is to:

assume that the order does matter (ie permutations),

then alter it so the order does not matter.

Going back to our pool ball example, let's say we just want to know which 3 pool balls are chosen, not the
order.
We already know that 3 out of 16 gave us 3,360 permutations.
But many of those are the same to us now, because we don't care what order!
For example, let us say balls 1, 2 and 3 are chosen. These are the possibilites:
Order does matter

Order doesn't matter

123
132
213
231
312
321

123

So, the permutations will have 6 times as many possibilites.

In fact there is an easy way to work out how many ways "1 2 3" could be placed in order, and we have
already talked about it. The answer is:
3! = 3 2 1 = 6
(Another example: 4 things can be placed in 4! = 4 3 2 1 = 24 different ways, try it for yourself!)
So we adjust our permutations formula to reduce it by how many ways the objects could be in order
(because we aren't interested in their order any more):

That formula is so important it is often just written in big parentheses like this:

where n is the number of things to choose from, and

we choose r of them
(No repetition, order doesn't matter)

It is often called "n choose r" (such as "16 choose 3")

And is also known as the Binomial Coefficient .
Notation
As well as the "big parentheses", people also use these notations:

Just remember the formula:

n!
r!(nr)!