Chapter 5

Some Rules of Probability

1
 Chapter Goals

After completing this chapter, you should be

able to:
 Explain three approaches to assessing
probabilities
 Apply common rules of probability, including the

Addition Rule and the Multiplication Rule

Chap 5-2
 Important Terms

 Probability – the chance that an uncertain event

will occur (always between 0 and 1)
 Experiment – a process of obtaining outcomes
for uncertain events
 Experimental Outcome – the most basic
outcome possible from a simple experiment
 Sample Space – the collection of all possible
experimental outcomes

Chap 5-3
 Section 5.1: Sample Space

The Sample Space is the collection of all

possible outcomes
e.g., All 6 faces of a die:

e.g., All 52 cards of a bridge deck:

Chap 5-4
 Events

 Experimental outcome – An outcome from a

sample space with one characteristic
 Example: A red card from a deck of cards

 Event – May involve two or more outcomes

simultaneously
 Example: An ace that is also red from a deck of
cards

Chap 5-5
 Exercise:
 A) What is the sample space of roll a dice?

 B) What is the sample space of:

 tossing a coin

 Tossing 2 coin

 Tossing 3 coin

Chap 5-6
 Experimental Outcomes
 A automobile consultant records fuel type and
vehicle type for a sample of vehicles
2 Fuel types: Gasoline, Diesel
3 Vehicle types: Truck, Car, SUV
e1
6 possible experimental outcomes:
Car e2
e1 Gasoline, Truck
e2 Gasoline, Car e3
e3 Gasoline, SUV e4
e4 Diesel, Truck Car e5
e5 Diesel, Car
e6 Diesel, SUV e6

Chap 5-7
Event: any subset of a sample space is called an event.

Unions, intersections and complements of events:

1- The UNION of two events A and B, denoted by A  B , is the set of elements which
are in either event.
2- The intersection of two events A and B, denoted by A  B , is the set of elements
which are in both events.
3- The complement of event A, denoted by A  , is the event that consists of all the
elements (outcomes) of the sample space that are not in A

Chap 5-8
 Example:
let S  {1, 2,3, 4,5, e, f , g}
A  {1, 2, e}, B  {2, f , g}, C  {1, 4,5, e, f }
find :
(1) A
(2) B  C
(3) A  C
(4) B  A
(5) C   A

(6) A  B  C 

(7) ( A  C )  B

Chap 5-9
Section 5.2: EVENTS

Mutually exclusive events:

Two events A and B are mutually exclusive if they cannot both occur at the same time
that means A B  
* Demorgan's law:
 
1- A  B    A  B  2- A  B    A  B 

Chap 5-10
 Mutually Exclusive Events
 If E1 occurs, then E2 cannot occur
 E1 and E2 have no common elements
E2 A card cannot be
E1
Black and Red at
Red the same time.
Black Cards
Cards

Chap 5-11
Venn diagrams: what events are represented by the tinted regions?

Draw Venn diagrams for:

( A  B ) A B AB 

Chap 5-12
 Section 5.3: some basic rules of probability

In other word we can rewrite the rules as:

(1) 0  P (A )  1
(2)
P (S )  1 and P ()  0
(3) P (A  B )  P (A )  P (B )
For any two mutually exclusive events A and B

(4) P (A )  P (A )  1  P (A )  1  P (A )
For any event A

Chap 4-13
Exercise 5.24: Given the mutually exclusive events Y and Z, for whichP (Y )  0.28
And P ( Z )  0.47 find: (hint: Draw Venn diagram):

(a) P( Y  )

(b) P ( Z  )

(c ) P ( Y  Z )

(d ) P( Y  Z )

(e) P ( Y   Z  )

Chap5-14
Exercise 5.21:

the probabilities that a computer store will sell 0,1,2,3,or at least 4 computers
on a typical business day are 0.10,0.15,0.20,0.25,and 0.30 .what are the
probabilities that on a typical day.

(a) At most three computers will be sold.

(b) At least two computers will be sold.

(c) Two or three computers will be sold.

Chap 5-15
Section 5.4: probability and odds

If an event is twice as likely to occur as not to occur, we say the odds are 2 to 1
that it will occur

The odds that an event will occur are given by the ratio of the
probability that it will occur to the probability that it will not occur

Note: if the probability of an event is P, the odds for its occurrence are a to b,
where a and b are positive values such that:
a p

b 1 p

Chap 5-16
 Exercise 5.33: Convert each of the following probabilities to odds:
 (a) The probability that the last digit of a postal zip code is 5, 6, 7,
8, or 0 is 0.6

 (b) The probability of randomly selecting the 8 letters alpha, beta,

gamma, delta, epsilon, zeta, eta, theta from the 24 letters of the
Greek alphabet is

Chap 5-17
  If the odds are a to b that an event will occur,
the probability of its occurrence is

Exercise 5.32: Convert each of the following odds to probabilities:-

(a) The odds that a particular horse will lose a race are 7 to 1.

(b) The odds are 3 to 5 that sequence of four coin tosses will result in two
heads and two tails.

Chap 5-18
Section 5.5: Addition rules

If K events are mutually exclusive, the probability that one of them will occur
equals the sum of their respective probabilities:

P( A1  A2  ...  Ak )  P( A1 )  P( A2 )  ...  P( Ak )
For any mutually exclusive events A1,A2,…,Ak

General Addition rule:

P (A  B )  P (A )  P (B )  P (A  B )

Chap 5-19
Chap 5-20
Section5.6: Conditional Probability
If P(B) in not equal to zero then the conditional probability of A relative to
B, namely, the probability of A given B, is

Example: Two events A and B are such that P (A )  0.40 , P (A  B )  0.30 .

P (B )  0.50 . Find

(a) P ( A  B )

(b) P ( A  B )

(c) P( A | B)

Chap 5-21
 Example: The following table gives the number of
students enrolled in Arabic and English courses in a
university having two colleges:

Movie Type
Gender Thriller comedy Total
Males 30 50 80
Females 45 15 60
Total 75 65 140
(i) What is the probability that a randomly selected person
likes a comedy?
Sol:
65
P (C ) 
140
(ii) What is the probability that a randomly chosen person is a
female given that the person likes a comedy?
15
P( F  C ) 140 15
Sol: P( F / C )   
P(C ) 65 65
140

Chap 5-22
Section 5.7: Independent events

if A and B are independent events , then

P (A  B )  P (A )  P (B )

That is: Event A is independent of event B if the probability of event A is not

affected by the occurrence or nonoccurrence of event B

If P (A | B )  P (A ) , we say that event A is independent of event B

Section 5.8: Multiplication rules

General P (A  B )  P (B )  P (A | B )
Multiplication rule
P (A  B )  P (A )  P (B | A )

Chap 5-23
Chap 5-24
 5.57 If X and Y are independent events and
P (x )  0.25 and P ( y )  0.50 find

(a) P( x | y )

(b) P ( x  y )
(c ) P ( x  y )
( d ) P (x '  y )

Chap 5-25
 Bayes’ Theorem

P(Ei )P(B | Ei )
P(Ei | B) 
P(E1 )P(B | E1 )  P(E2 )P(B | E2 )    P(Ek )P(B | Ek )

 where:
Ei = ith event of interest of the k possible events
B = new event that might impact P(Ei)
Events E1 to Ek are mutually exclusive and collectively
exhaustive

Chap 5-26
 Chapter Summary

 Described approaches to assessing probabilities

 Developed common rules of probability
 Addition Rules
 Multiplication Rules
 Defined conditional probability
 Independent events
 Bayes’ Theorem

Chap 5-27