Problems on Probability Set-1(Problems discussed in class)

1. A perfectly balanced coin is tossed n times. Find the probability that there is
at least one head.
2. Assume that people's birthdays are equally likely to occur among the 365
days of the year. (Here we ignore leap years and the fact that birth rates are
not exactly uniform over the year.) Find the probability p that no two people
in a group of n people will have a common birthday.
3. The mathematics department consists of 25 full professors, 15 associate
professors, and 35 assistant professors. A committee of 6 is selected at
random from the faculty of the department. Find the probability that all the
members of the committee are assistant professors.
4. Consider a poker hand of five cards. Find the probability of getting: four of a
kind (i.e. , four cards of the same face value) assuming the five cards are
chosen at random.
5. Suppose n balls are distributed into n boxes so that all of the nn possible
arrangements are equally likely. Compute the probability that only box 1 is
empty.
6. A poker hand has five cards drawn from an ordinary deck of 52 cards. Find
the probability that the poker hand has exactly 2 kings.
7. A deck of playing cards has 4 suits of 1 3 cards each, namely clubs,
diamonds, hearts, and spades.
(a) What is the probability that in a hand of 5 cards exactly 3 are clubs?
(b) What is the probability that in a hand of 5 cards exactly 3 are of the same suit?
8. In a poker hand what is the probability of getting exactly two pairs? Here, a
hand such as (2, 2, 2, 2, x) does not count as two pairs but as a 4-of-a-kind.
9. Suppose we have a box containing r balls numbered 1 , 2, . . . , r. A random
sample of size n is drawn without replacement and the numbers on the balls
noted. These balls are then returned to the box, and a second random sample
of size m is then drawn without replacement. Find the probability that the
two samples had exactly k balls in common.

10.In the committee problem discussed earlier, find the probability that the
committee of 6 is composed of 2 full professors, 3 associate professors, and
1 assistant professor.
11.Suppose, a box contains 40 envelopes of which 25 are ordinary (i.e. not
meant for airmail) and 16 are unstamped while the number of unstamped
ordinary envelops is 10. What is the probability that an envelope chosen
from the box at random is a stamped airmail envelope?
12.What is the probability that if a family of 2 kids has a boy, the other is a girl?
13.In the application of insecticide on mosquitoes, it is found that 80% are
killed in the initial application. 40% of the survivors of the 1st application
would succumb to the 2nd application, 20% of those who survive after 2nd
application will succumb to 3rd and so on. What is the probability that:
(a) A mosquito chosen at random will survive all the four application?
(b) Given that a mosquito has survived the first application, what is the
probability that it will survive all the four application?
14.A test for a certain disease is assumed to be correct 95% of the time: if a
person has the disease, the tests are positive with probability 0.95 and if the
person does not have the disease, the test results are negative with
probability 0.95. A random person drawn from a certain population has
probability 0.001of having the disease. Given that a person just tested
positive, what is the probability of having the disease?
15.Suppose a boy either walks to school or he goes to school by bus. If the boy
goes to school by bus on a certain day, the probability that next day also he
goes by bus is 7/10. If the boy walks to school on a certain day, the
probability that he walks to school the next day is 3/5.
(a) Given that on Tuesday of a particular week the boy walks to school,
what is the probability that he goes to school on Thursday of the same
week by bus?
(b) Given that he walks to school on both Tuesday and Thursday of a
week, what is the probability that he also walks to school on
Wednesday of the week?