Problem Set 1: Probability – Basic concepts

1. An elevator with two passengers stops at the second, third, and fourth floors. If it is equally
likely that a passenger gets off at any of the three floors, what is the probability that the
passengers get off at different floors?
2. Four players A, B, C, and D participate in a chess tournament. In the first round A will play
with B and C will paly with D. Then the two winners will play for the final and the two losers
will play for the 3rd position. List all the outcomes. Find the probability that i) A wins the
trophy; ii) B gets into the final.
3. If a pair of dice is thrown, what is the probability that the sum is i) 8; ii) neither 7 nor 11.
4. Find the probability of a 4 turning up at least once in two tosses of a fair die.
5. A card is drawn from a well shuffled pack of 52 cards, Find the probability that it is
i) neither a red card nor a queen; ii) either a spade or an ace.
6. The odds against A solving a problem are 4 to 3 and the odds in favour of B solving the
.same problem are 7 to 5. Find the probability that the problem will be solved, if they try
independently.
7. Suppose that each of two dice is biased so that when either die is rolled, the probability that
the number will appear is 0.1 for or and is 0.3 for or . If these two dice
are rolled independently, what is the probability that the sum of the two numbers that appear
will be 7?
8. Among the workers in a factory, only 30% receive a bonus. Among those receiving bonus,
only 20% are skilled. What is the probability that a randomly selected worker is skilled and
receiving bonus?
9. A box contains 6 red balls, 4 white balls, and 5 black balls. If four balls are drawn at random,
find the probability that there is at least one ball in each colour.
10. A bag contains 8 red balls, 4 green balls, and 8 yellow balls. A ball is drawn at random from
the bag, and it is not a red ball. Find the probability that it is a green ball.
11. There are two boxes, First box contains 3 white balls and 4 black balls and the second box
contains 4 white and 3 black balls. One of the boxes is selected randomly and a balldrwan
from it. What is the probability that it is white ball?
12. Suppose a fair coin is independently tossed twice. A, B, and C are events defined as
follows. A: Heads appears on the first toss; B: Heads appears on the second toss; C: Both
tosses yield the same outcome. Are A, B, and C independent?
13. Two coins are tossed. Let A denote the event “at most one head on the two tosses,” and let
B denote the event “one head and one tail in both tosses.” Are A and B independent?
14. Suppose A and B are two events with , and . What
is ?
15. Alice speaks truth in 75% of the cases and Bob speaks truth in 80% of the cases. In what
percentage of cases are they likely to contradict each other in stating the same fact?
16. Suppose that ̅ What is ?
17. If A and B are mutually exclusive and exhaustive events with , find .
18. Why is it not possible to have two events A and B such that and
?
19. Alice and Bob throw alternatively with a pair of dice. Alice wins if he throws 6 before Bob
throws 7. Bob wins if he throws 7 before Alice throws 6. If Alice begins, what are the
chances of her winning?
20. Two gamblers play the game of “heads or tails,” in which each time a fair coin lands heads
up player A wins $1 from B, and each time it lands tails up, player B wins $1 from A.
Suppose that player A initially has a$ and player B has b$. If they continue to play this game
successively, what is the probability that (a) A will be ruined; (b) the game goes forever with
nobody winning? [Saeed Gharamani - Example: 3.15]
21. Four roads R1, R2, R3, and R4 lead away from a prison. A prisoner tries to escape from the
prison and selects a road at random. If he selects road R1, the probability that he will be
caught is ; if he selects road R2, the probability is ; if he selects road R3, the
probability is ; and if he selects road R4, the probability is . What is the probability
that the prisoner will succeed escaping? Given the prisoner escaped, what is the probability
that he used road R3?
22. There are ten urns of which each of three contain 1 white and 9 black balls; each of another
three contains 9 white and 1 black balls, and each of the remaining four contains 5 white
and 5 black balls. One of the urns is selected at random and a ball taken blindly from it and
it turns out to be white. What is the probability that an urn containing 1 white and 9 black
balls was selected?
23. In a given binary communication channel that carries messages by using only two signals,
say 0 and 1, assume the following: 40% of the time a 1 is transmitted; the probability that a
transmitted 0 correctly received is 0.90; and the probability that a transmitted 1 correctly
received is 0.95. Determine (i) the probability of a 1 being received, (ii) Given a 1 is
received, the probability that 1 was transmitted; (iii) the probability for an error.
24. A laboratory blood test is 95 percent effective in detecting a certain disease when it is, in
fact, present. However, the test also yields a “false positive” result for 1 percent of the
healthy persons tested. (That is, if a healthy person is tested, then, with probability 0.01, the
test result will imply he has the disease.) If 0.5 percent of the population actually has the
disease, what is the probability a person has the disease given that his test result is
positive? [Sheldon M Ross - Example: 1.14]