Mathemission

CBSE Math Class 12

Probability
(Notes)

Ashutosh Kumar
MATHEMISSION

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Probability Notes

Mathemission
1 Some Important Definitions
Experiment: An operation which results some well defined outcomes is
called an experiment.

Random Experiment: An experiment whose outcome can not be foretold

or predicted is known as a random experiment.
On the other hand, an experiment whose outcomes can be foretold is
not a random experiment. For example, when a stone is thrown upward
it is certain that it will come downward and hit the ground. Therefore,
throwing of a stone up (and guessing whether it will hang into the air
or hit the ground ) is not a random experiment.

Sample Space The set of all possible outcomes of a random experiment is

called the ample space for that experiment. It is generally denoted by
S.
Example 1: When a coin is tossed, either a Head or a Tail will come
up. If H denotes the occurrence of a Head and T denotes the occurrence
of Tail, then the sample space is given by

S = {H, T }

Sample Point (or Event Point) : Each element of the sample space is
called a sample point (or and event point).
Example 2: When a die is thrown, the sample space is

S = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6}

Here sample points are: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

Event: A subset of the sample space is called an event.

• The empty subset, φ, is also a subset of S and it corresponds to

the Impossible Event.
• The set S is also a subset of S and it corresponds to a Sure Event.

Simple Event (or Elementary Event) : An event is called a simple event

(or elementary event) if it corresponds to a singleton subset of the sam-
ple space S.

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Compound Event (or Mixed Event): A subset of the sample space which
have more than one sample point is called a compound event.

Trial: When a particular experiment is repeated under similar conditions

and does not give the same result each time but may result in any
one of the several outcomes, the experiment is called a trial (and the
outcomes are called cases). And, the number of times the experiment
is repeated is called the number of trials.

Equally Likely Outcomes: The outcomes are said to be equally likely

when we have no reason to believe that one is more likely to occur
than other.
Example 3: When an unbiased die thrown all the six faces 1, 2, 3, 4, 5,
and 6 are equally likely to come up.

Exhaustive cases: For a random experiment, a set of outcomes is called to

be exhaustive if one of them must necessarily happen every time the
experiment is performed.
Example 4: When a die is thrown the outcomes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 from an
exhaustive sets of cases.

2 Probability of Occurrence of an Event

Let E be an event and S be the sample space, then the probability of occur-
rence of the event E is given by
number of elements of E
P (E) =
number of elements of S

n(E)
P (E) =
n(S)
NOTE: The probability of occurrence of an event is any number lying be-
tween 0 and 1.
0 ≤ P (E) ≤ 1
Example 5: What is the probability that in 24 throws of two dice, double
six fails to appear?

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Solution:In each throw of two dice number of outcomes= 36,
So total number of possible outcomes in 24 throws n(S) = (36)24 .
Again, in each throw the number of outcomes in which a double six fails to
appear = 35
So, in 24 throws the number of outcomes in which a double six fails to appear
n(E) = (35)24
So, probability that in 24 throws of two dice, double six fails to appear,
n(E) 3524
P (E) = = 24 = 0.5086
n(S) 36

3 Complement of an Event:
The non-occurrence of the event E is called the complement of event E. It
is denoted by E 0 or E. In other words, E 0 occurs if only if E does not occur.
Therefore,
P (E 0 ) = 1 − P (E)

4 Odds in Favor and Odds Against

If S denotes the sample space and E be the event. Let E 0 be the complement
of the event, then
n(E) P (E)
• Odds in favour of event E = 0
=
n(E ) P (E 0 )
n(E 0 ) P (E 0 )
• Odds against event E = =
n(E) P (E)

EXERCISES

1. If three coins are tossed, write the sample space and event of getting
tw heads and one tail. Also find the number of elements in them.

2. A coin is tossed successively three times. find the probability of

getting exactly one had or two heads.

3. Two dice are thrown simultaneously. What is the probability of

obtaining a total score of 7.

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4. If a leap year selected at random, what is the chance that it will
contain 53 Tuesdays?

5. What is the odd in favors of throwing at least 8 in a single throw of

two dice?

6. From a pack of 52 playing cards, three cards are drawn at random.

Find the probability of drawing a king, a queen and a jack.?
1 1
7. If P (A) = and P (B) = , find P (A0 ), P (B 0 ).
3 2
8. 4 boys and 3 girls are selected in a row, find the odds in favour and
odds against "all the girls sitting together".

9. If two dice are thrown, what is the probability that unequal numbers
will come up on them?

10. A bag contains 7 black and 4 white balls. Two balls are drawn
simultaneously from the bag. find the probability that one is a white
ball and other is a black ball.

ANSWERS

2. 3
4. 2
6. 16 8. 1 : 6 6 : 1 10. 28
4 7 5525 55

1 5 2 1 5
3. 6
5. 7
7. 3 2
9. 6

5 Some Important Representations

A ∩ B: The event of simultaneous occurrence of both the events A and B.
It is also denoted by AB

A ∪ B: The event of occurrence of at least one of the events A an B. In

other words, it is the event of occurrence of either event A or event B
or both.

A − B: The occurrence of the event A but not B. It is also denoted as A∩B 0 .

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6 Mutually Exclusive Events (or Disjoint Events)
Two or more event are said to be mutually exclusive events if one of them
occurs, others will not occur. That is, no two events occur together. Thus,
events E1 , E2 , E3 , · · · , En are mutually exclusive iff,
Ei ∩ Ej = φ, i 6= j
In particular for two mutually exclusive events E1 and E2
E1 ∩ E2 = φ
And so, P (E1 ∩ E2 ) = 0
Example 6: When a coin is tossed the event of occurrence of a head and
the event of occurrence of a tail are mutually exclusive event.
S = {H, T } E1 = {H}, E2 = {T } E1 ∩ E2 = φ
Example 7: When a die is thrown the sample space is S = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6}

Let A = the event of occurrence of number greater than4 = {5, 6}

B = the event of occurrence of an odd number = {1, 3, 5}
C = the event of occurrence of an even number = {2, 4, 6}
Here B ∩ C = φ so B and C are mutually exclusive events
But as A ∩ B 6= φ and A ∩ C 6= φ so they are notmutually exclusive events
Example 8: Consider a die which has faces 1, 2 and 6 coloured in red and
the faces 3, 4 and 5 in green. Write the sample space. Check whether the
following two events are mutually exclusive or not.
A = The event that die shows an even number
B = The event that die shows red colour.

Solution:Assigning the letter R for red and G for green the sample space
for the experiment is given as,
S = {1R, 2R, 3G, 4G, 5G, 6R}
Now, writing sets of events,
A = {2R, 4G, 6R}

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B = {1R, 2R, 6R}
We observe that,
A ∩ B 6= φ
Thus, events A and B are not mutually exclusive.

7 The Addition Rules of Probability

Basic Addition Rule:
If A and B are two mutually exclusive events (disjoint sets) then the prob-
ability of occurrence of at least one of them is the sum their individual
probabilities. That is,

A ∩ B = φ =⇒ P (A ∪ B) = P (A) + P (B)

similarly, if A1 , A2 , A3 ...An are n events such that Ai ∩ Aj = φ then

n
!
[
P Ai = P (A1 ) + P (A2 ) + P (A3 ) + ... + P (An )
i=1

The above equation is known as finite additivity.

Extended Addition Rule:

If A1 , A2 , A3 ... are mutually exclusive events then,

P (A1 ∪ A2 ∪ A3 ...) = P (A1 ) + P (A2 ) + P (A3 ) + ...

The above equation is known as countable additivity.

8 The Inclusion-Exclusion Principle (proba-

bilistic version)
There are various methods to formulate the inclusion-exclusion principle.
Here we prove this theorem by principle of mathematical induction. For this
let us start this version from two events.

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Inclusion-Exclusion Principle for Two Events
Let A and B are any two events associated to the sample space S. Then,
P (A ∪ B) = P (A) + P (B) − P (A ∩ B)
Proof: To prove this, we use the basic addition rule on two mutually
exclusive events. Observing that events A and B − A are mutually exclusive
events, so
P {A ∪ (B − A)} = P (A) + P (B − A)
since A ∪ (B − A) = A ∪ B therefore,
P (A ∪ B) = P (A) + P (B − A) (1)
Also, events (A ∩ B) and (B − A) are mutually exclusive events, so
P {(A ∩ B) ∪ (B − A)} = P (A ∩ B) + P (B − A)
but, (A ∩ B) ∪ (B − A) = B, therefore
P (B) = P (A ∩ B) + P (B − A) (2)
From equations (1) and (2) eliminating P (B − A), we achieve
P (A ∪ B) = P (A) + P (B) − P (A ∩ B) 

Inclusion-Exclusion Principle for n events

Let A1 , A2 , A3 , ..., An be n events then
n
! n
[ X X X
P Ai = P (Ai ) − P (Ai ∩ Aj ) + P (Ai ∩ Aj ∩ Ak )
i=1 i=1 i<j i<j<k

− ... + (−1) n+1

P (Ai ∩ A2 ∩ A3 ...An ) (3)

Some Important Results to Remember

• P (A ∪ B) = P (A) + P (B), if A and B are mutually exclusive.

• P (A0 ) = 1 − P (A)

• P (A − B) = P (A ∩ B 0 ) = P (A) − P (A ∩ B)

• P (A ∪ B ∪ C) = P (A) + P (B) + P (C) − P (A ∩ B) − P (B ∩ C) −

P (A ∩ C) + P (A ∩ ∩C)

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EXERCISES
2 4 14
1. If P (A) = , P (B) = and P (A ∩ B) = , then find P (A ∪ B).
3 9 45
2. Two cards are drawn at random from a pack of cards. Find the
probability tha both the cards are of red color or they are queen.

3. Two dice are tossed once. fin dthe probability of getting an even
number on first die, or a total of 8.

4. A and B are two candidates seeking admission into IIT. The prob-
ability that A is selected is 0.5 and the probability that both are
selected is at most 0.3. Is it possible that the probability of B get-
ting selected is 0.9? Show your work.

5. A bag contains 6 white and 4 red balls. Two balls are drawn at
random. what is the chance that they will be of the same color?

6. If from a pack of 52 cards two are drawn at rando. What is the

probability that hey will be both spade, heart or club?
3 1 1
7. If P (A) = , P (B) = and P (A0 ∩ B 0 ) = . Prove that A and B
7 2 14
are mutually exclusive events.

8. The odds in favor of standing first of three students at an examina-

tion are 1 : 2, 2 : 5, and 1 : 7 respectively. what is the probability
either of them will stand first.
3 1 13
9. If P (A) = , P (B 0 ) = and P (A0 ∩ B 0 ) = . Find P (A ∪ B) and
8 3 24
P (A ∩ B).

ANSWERS

4 1 5 3 11 1
1. ,
5 5
3. 9
6. 17
9. ,
24 4

285 7 125
2. 2652
5. 15
8. 168

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9 Conditional Probability
Let A and B are two events such that B 6= φ then P (A|B) is the conditional
probability of occurrence of A when B has already occurred and it is given
by
P (A ∩ B)
P (A|B) =
P (B)
Or
n(A ∩ B)
P (A|B) =
n(B)

10 Independent Events
Two or more events are said to be independent if the occurrence or non-
occurrence of any of them does not affect the probability of occurrence or
non occurrence of other events. If A an B are independent events, then

P (A) · P (B) = P (A ∩ B)

Example 9: When a coin is tossed twice,the event of occurrence of head in

the first throw and the event of occurrence of head in the second throw are
independent events.

Some Important Points

• If A an B are independent events, then

P (A|B) = P (A)

• If E1 , E2 , E3 , · · · , En are independent events, then

0 0 0 0
P (E1 ∪ E2 ∪ E3 ∪ · · · ∪ En )) = 1 − P (E1 ) · P (E2 ) · P (E3 ) · · · · P (En )

• If A an B are two events such that B 6= φ then

0
P (A|B) + P (A |B) = 1

• If A an B are two events such that A 6= φ then

0
P (B) = P (A) · P (B|A) + P (A0 ) · P (B|A )

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• If A an B are independent events, then

– P (A ∩ B) = P (A) · P (B|A) given P (A) 6= 0

– P (A ∩ B) = P (B) · P (A|B) given P (B) 6= 0

11 Theorem of Total Probability

If If E1 , E2 , E3 , · · · , En be n mutually exclusive and exhaustive events and E
is an event which occurs in conjunction with one of the events E1 , E2 , E3 , · · · , En
, ie.
A ⊆ (E1 ∪ E2 ∪ E3 ∪ · · · ∪ En )
Then

P (E) = P (E1 ) · P (E|E1 ) + P (E2 ) · P (E|E2 ) + · · · + P (En ) · P (E|En )

Points to Remember
? If A and B are independent events then

• A and B 0 are independent. Therefore,

P (A ∩ B 0 ) = P (A) · P (B 0 )

• A0 and B are independent. Therefore,

P (A0 ∩ B) = P (A0 ) · P (B)

• A0 and B 0 are independent. Therefore,

P (A0 ∩ B 0 ) = P (A0 ) · P (B 0 )

? Mutually exclusive events are not independent. And, indepen-

dent (and non- impossible) events are not mutually exclusive.
It means,

• If P (A ∪ B) = P (A) + P (B), then P (A ∩ B) 6= P (A) · P (B)

• If P (A ∩ B) = P (A) · P (B), then P (A ∪ B) 6= P (A) + P (B)

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EXERCISES

1. A die is thrown twice. What is the chance of coming up of the

number 6 in the first throw and and odd number in the second
throw?

2. Three students appear at an examination. The probability of their

success are 31 , 14 , 15 respectively. Find the probability of at least two
successes.

3. Two people A and B throw a coin alternately till one of them gets
a ’head’ and wins the game. Find their respective probabilities of
winning.

4. If P (A) = 7
10
, P (A∩B) = 3
10
and P (A0 ∩B 0 ) = 1
5
then find the values
of

a P (B)
b P (B|A)
c P (A|B)
d P (A0 |B 0 )

5. A box contains 3 red and 5 blue balls. Two balls are drawn one
at a time at random without replacement. Find the probability of
getting one red and one blue ball.

6. A card is drawn at random from a deck of cards, what is the prob-

ability that it is a king if it is known that the drawn card is red.

7. Five people A, B, C, D, E contest in an election. Three people are

to be elected. If one person A has been elected uncontested. Find
the probability that B would be elected?

8. A bag contains 5 white and 4 black balls. One ball is drawn and
kept aside, colour unnoticed, then another ball is drawn. what is the
probability of this ball of being white?

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ANSWERS

1 1 1 3 1
1. 12
4. ,
12 3
c 4
7. 3
1
2. 1
2
d 3 8. 1
6 5. a 5
2

1 3 15 5
3. 3
b 7
6. 28
9. 4

12 Bayes’ Theorem
Partition of a Set
A family of sets E1 , E2 , E3 , · · · , En is said to form a partition of a set S if

• E1 , E2 , E3 , · · · , En are non empty sets.

• E1 ∩ E2 = φ for i 6= j (mutually exclusive)

• E1 ∪ E2 ∪ E3 ∪ · · · ∪ En = S (mutually exhaustive)

Theorem
E1 , E2 , E3 , · · · , En be n mutually exclusive and exhaustive events and A is
an event, associated with S, and occurs together with either of Ek . Then

P (Ek ) · P (A|Ek )
P (Ek |A) =
P (E1 ) · P (A|E1 ) + P (E2 ) · P (A|E2 ) + · · · + P (En ) · P (A|En )

NOTE: These are the terminologies associated to the Bayes’ Theorem

• The events E1 , E2 , E3 , · · · , En are called hypotheses.

• The probability P (Ek ) is known as priori probability of the hypothesis

Ek .

• The conditional probability P (Ek |A) is known as posterior probability

of the hypothesis Ek .

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Example 10: A bag A contains 2 white and 3 red balls and a bag B contains
4 white and 5 red balls. One ball is drawn at random from one of the bags
and it is found to be red. Find the probability that it was drawn from the
bag B.
Solution:

Let E1 =the event of ball being drawn from bag A

E2 =the event of ball being drawn from bag B
A =The event that the ball is red

since, both the bags are equally likely to be selected,

1
P (E1 ) = P (E2 ) =
2

3
P (A|E1 ) =The probability of a red ball selected from bag A =
5
5
P (A|E2 ) =The probability of a red ball selected from bag B =
9
Therefore, the required probability is given by

P (E2 ) · P (A|E2 )
P (E2 |A) =
P (E1 ) · P (A|E1 ) + P (E2 ) · P (A|E2 )
1
2
× 59
=1 3 1 5
2
×5+2×9
25
=
52

13 Probability Distribution
Random Variable
Random variable is areal valued function whose domain is the sample space
of a random experiment. Random variable is generally denoted by X, Y, Z
etc.

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Discrete Random Variable
It is a type of random variable which contains only countable infinite number
of values or finite number of values.

Continuous Random Variable

A random variable which can take any value between two given limits is
called a continuous random variable.

Probability Distribution of a Random Variable

The description of the values of a random variable together with the corre-
sponding probabilities is the probability distribution.
Example 11: Probability distribution when two coins are tossed where the
random variable x denotes the number of heads occurred.

P (X = 0) =probability of occurrence of zero head

1 1 1
=P (T T ) = × =
2 2 4
P (X = 1) =probability of occurrence of one head
1 1 1 1 1
=P (HT ) + P (T H) = × + × =
2 2 2 2 2
P (X = 2) =probability of occurrence of two heads
1 1 1
=P (HH) = × =
2 2 4
Thus the probability distribution is given by the following table

X 0 1 2
1 1 1
P (X) 4 2 4

Mean and Variance of a Random Variable

Let X be a random variable which takes the values x1 , x2 , x3 , cdots, xn with
their corresponding probabilities p1 , p2 , p3 , cdots, pn respectively. Then the

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mean of x, denoted by µ, is the number ni=1 xi pi . The mean of X is also
P
called the expectation of X, denoted by E(X). Therefore
The mean of X,
n
X
µ = E(X) = xi p i = x1 p 1 + x2 p 2 + · · · + xn p n
i=1

The variance of X, denoted by V ar(X) or σx2 is defined as

n
X
V ar(X) = σx2 = (xi − µ)2 p(xi )
i=1

or equivalently,

σx2 = E(X − µ)2

And, the positive square root of the variance is called the Standard Devia-
tion of the random variable.
p
σx = V ar(X)

14 Bernoulli Trials and Binomial Distribu-

tion
Bernoulli Trials
Of a random experiment, the trials are called Bernoulli trials, if they satisfy
the following four conditions
1. The number of trials is finite.
2. The trials are independent of each other.
3. Each trial has exactly two outcomes (or can be made into two out-
comes), the success and the failure.
4. The probability of success (and failure) remains same in each trial.

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Binomial Distribution
Let p denotes the probability of occurrence of an event E and q be the prob-
ability of non occurrence of the event E .

Let probability of success =P (E) = p

and probability of failure =P (E 0 ) = q

and X denotes the number of successes in n trials, then the probability of r

successes is given by the probability function P (X = r) which is

P (X = r) = nCr pr q n−r
And, the Binomial Probability Distribution of the random variable x is
given as the following table.

X 0 1 2 ··· r ··· n
P (X) qn nC1 p q n−1 nC2 p2 q n−2 ··· ··· nCr pr q n−r pn

Points to Remember
• The Binomial Distribution is the binomial expansion of (p + q)n .

• Mean of the binomial distribution is np.

• The variance of the binomial distribution is npq.

• The binomial distribution is denoted by B(n, p), where n is the

number of Bernoulli trials and p is the probability of success.

EXERCISES

1. If a die is thrown 5 times, what is the chance that an even number

will come up exactly 3 times?

2. 10 coins are tossed. What is the probability that exactly 5 heads

appear? Also find the probability of getting at least 8 heads.

3. If the chance that a ship arrives safely at a post is 9

10
,. Find the

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chance that out of 5 expected ships at least 4 will arrive safely.

4. Five shots are fired at a target. If each shot has probability 0.6 of
hitting the target, what is the probability that the target will be hit
at least once?

5. Two dice are thrown together 4 times. Find the probability that
both dice will show the same number twice.

6. A dice is thrown 3 times. If getting a six is considered as a success,

find the probability of

a. 3 successes
b. at least 2 successes

7. In a hurdle race, aplayer has to cross 10 hurdles. The probability

that he will clear each hurdle is 5/6. What is the probability that
he will knock down fewer than 2 hurdles?

8. A coin is tossed 5 times. What is the probability that head appears

an even number of times?

ANSWERS

5 91854 25 510
1. 16
3. 100000
5. 216 7. 3·69
1
6. a 216
63
2. , 7
256 128
4. 0.98976 b 19
216
8. 15
32

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