Tutorial 2

Q1 : The release of two out of three prisoners has been announced. but their identity is
kept secret. One of the prisoners considers asking a friendly guard to tell him who is the
prisoner other than himself that will be released, but hesitates based on the following
rationale: at the prisoner's present state of knowledge, the probability of being released
is 2/3, but after he knows the answer, the probability of being released will become 1 /2,
since there will be two prisoners (including himself) whose fate is unknown and exactly
one of the two will be released. What is wrong with this line of reasoning?

Q2: Consider n people who are attending a party. We assume that every person has an
equal probability of being born on any day during the year. independent of everyone else,
and ignore the additional complication presented by leap years (i.e. , assume that nobody
is born on February 29) . What is the probability that each person has a distinct birthday?

Q3: Eight rooks are placed in distinct squares of an 8 x 8 chessboard, with all possible
placements being equally likely. Find the probability that all the rooks are safe from one
another, i.e .. that there is no row or column with more than one rook.

Q4: Three married couples have purchased theatre tickets and are seated in a row
consisting of just six seats. If they take their seats in a completely random fashion
(random order), what is the probability that Jim and Paula (husband and wife) sit in the
two seats on the far left? What is the probability that Jim and Paula end up sitting next to
one another? What is the probability that at least one of the wives ends up sitting next to
her husband?

Q5 (the Monty Hall problem) is popular; the name comes from a game show host. You are
on a game show. There are three doors: behind one door is a car; behind the others are
goats. You pick a door and may get what is behind it. Suppose you picked door No.1, but
you did not open it yet. The host, who knows what is behind the doors, opens another
door, say, No.3, with a goat behind it, and offers you to switch to door No.2. Is it
beneficial to switch?

Q6 (Bertrand's Paradox). A chord is drawn at random in the unit circle. What is the
probability that the chord is longer than the side of the equilateral triangle inscribed in
the circle?

Q7 Buffon’s needle problem: A needle (rod) of length / is tossed at random on a plane

that is ruled with a series of parallel lines a distance 2/ apart. We wish to find the
probability that the needle will intersect one of the lines.
Q8 A box in a certain supply room contains four 40-W lightbulbs, five 60-W bulbs, and six
75-W bulbs. Suppose that three bulbs are randomly selected.
(a) What is the probability that exactly two of the selected bulbs are rated 75 W?
(b) What is the probability that all three of the selected bulbs have the same rating?
(c) What is the probability that one bulb of each type is selected?
(d) Suppose now that bulbs are to be selected one by one until a 75-W bulb is found.
What is the probability that it is necessary to examine at least six bulbs?

Q9 A popular Dilbert cartoon strip (popular among statisticians, anyway) shows an

allegedly “random” number generator produce the sequence 999999 with the
accompanying comment, “That’s the problem with randomness: you can never be sure.”
Most people would agree that 999999 seems less “random” than, say, 703928, but in what
sense is that true? Imagine we randomly generate a six-digit number, i.e., we make six
draws with replacement from the digits 0 through 9.

(a) What is the probability of generating 999999?

(b) What is the probability of generating 703928?
(c) What is the probability of generating a sequence of six identical digits?
(d) What is the probability of generating a sequence with no identical digits? (Comparing
the answers to (c) and (d) gives some sense of why some sequences feel intuitively more
random than others.)
(e) Here’s a real challenge: what is the probability of generating a sequence with exactly
one repeated digit?

Q10 An elevator in a ten-floor building leaves the first floor with six passengers.
Assuming all possible outcomes to be equally likely, find the probabilities of the
following events.

(a) Three passengers will get off the elevator on the second floor, one passenger on the
third floor, and two on the fifth.
(b) Three passengers will get off on the second floor, and one on the third.
(c) No two passengers will get off on the same floor.
(d) Two passengers will get off on the same floor, and four more on another floor.
(e) Two passengers will get off on the same floor, and three more on another floor.
Q11

Q12 Ten guests came to a dinner party. The host had had plans where each guest would
sit, but the guests ignored it and chose seats at random. Find the probability that at most
two guests chose the seats that had been intended for them.

Q13

Q14
Q15

Q16