Difference between C(5,i)/C(20,3) and (C(5,i)*C(20-5,3-i))/C(20,3)

  • Thread starter Thread starter s0ft
  • Start date Start date
  • Tags Tags
    Difference
s0ft
Messages
83
Reaction score
0
The question goes this way:
Five men in a group of 20 are graduates. If three men are chosen out of 20 at random, what is the probability of at least one being graduates?
This can be done by adding the probabilities for exactly 1 graduate being included in the group, exactly 2 and exactly 3 like this :
P = P(1) + P(2) + P(3)
= C(5,1)*C(15,2)/C(20,3) + C(5,2)*C(15,1)/C(20,3) + C(5,3)*C(15,0)/C(20,3)
Now, the numerators of these terms give the total number of favourable cases for P(1), P(2) and P(3). But if I only put the primary criterion i.e. number of graduates to be chosen from total i.e. C(5,1), C(5,2) and C(5,3) and remove the multiplicative terms for non graduates combinations i.e. C(15,2), C(15,1) and C(15,0) what would the probability now give?
At first, I couldn't figure that I had to account for all possible favourable cases for each term and I did exactly what I wrote above. I put only the C(5,1) and so on without any thoughts for the second part, C(15,2)... After I found something was wrong, I managed to get to the right solution. But the question in the above paragraph arose.
 
Physics news on Phys.org
hi s0ft! :smile:
s0ft said:
Five men in a group of 20 are graduates. If three men are chosen out of 20 at random, what is the probability of at least one being graduates?

But if I only put the primary criterion i.e. number of graduates to be chosen from total i.e. C(5,1), C(5,2) and C(5,3) and remove the multiplicative terms for non graduates combinations i.e. C(15,2), C(15,1) and C(15,0) what would the probability now give?

nothing that has anything to do with the given question :confused:

(btw, it would have been a lot quicker to find the probability of no graduates, and then subtract from 1 :wink:)
 
Namaste & G'day Postulate: A strongly-knit team wins on average over a less knit one Fundamentals: - Two teams face off with 4 players each - A polo team consists of players that each have assigned to them a measure of their ability (called a "Handicap" - 10 is highest, -2 lowest) I attempted to measure close-knitness of a team in terms of standard deviation (SD) of handicaps of the players. Failure: It turns out that, more often than, a team with a higher SD wins. In my language, that...
Hi all, I've been a roulette player for more than 10 years (although I took time off here and there) and it's only now that I'm trying to understand the physics of the game. Basically my strategy in roulette is to divide the wheel roughly into two halves (let's call them A and B). My theory is that in roulette there will invariably be variance. In other words, if A comes up 5 times in a row, B will be due to come up soon. However I have been proven wrong many times, and I have seen some...
Back
Top