Biplab Sinha Mahapatra

School of Applied Science and Humanities

Fundamental of Probability

1. (i) A fair die tossed twice. Find the probability of getting 4, 5 or 6 on the first toss and 1, 2, 3 or 4 in second
toss. (ii) Suppose a die is tossed 5 times. What is the probability of getting exactly 2 fours?
1
Ans: (i) (ii) 0.161
3
2. Two cards are drawn from a well shuffled pack of 52 cards. Find the probability that they are both aces if
the first card is (a) replaced (b) not replaced.
1 1
Ans: (a) 169 (b) 221
3. A box contains 10 red and 6 white and 4 black balls. Three balls are drawn randomly, find the probability
that the balls are
(i) All white
(ii) Two red and a white ball
(iii) Different colors
1 3 4
Ans: (i) 57 (ii) 76 (iii) 19
4. Two urns contain 3 white, 7 red, 15 black and 10 white, 6 red, 9 black balls respectively. One ball is drawn
from each urn. Find the probability that both the balls are of same color.
Ans: 0.3312
5. A bag contains 7 red and 5 white balls. Four balls are drawn at random. What is the probability that two of
them be white and two red?
14
Ans: 33
6. Find the probability that a leap year selected at random will contain 53 Sundays.
2
Ans: 7
7. Find the probability of a 4 turning up at least once in two tosses of a fair die.
11
Ans: 36
8. When two dice are thrown, find the probability that difference of points on the dice is 2 or 3.
7
Ans: 18
9. A box contains 5 red balls and 10 white balls. Two balls are drawn at random from this box without
replacement. What is the probability that
(i) The second ball is white
(ii) The first ball drawn is red; given the second ball drawn is white.
10 1
Ans: (i) 21 (ii) 10
10. Three cards are drawn from an ordinary deck of 52 cards. Find the probability that
 (a) All cards are of one suit
(b) At least 2 aces are drawn.
4𝐶 ×13𝐶 4𝐶 ×48𝐶 +4𝐶
Ans: (a) 152 3 (b) 2 52 1 3
𝐶3 𝐶3

11. Find the probability that a bridge player is given 13 cards of which 9 cards are of one suit.
4𝐶 ×13𝐶 ×39𝐶 4
Ans: 1 52 9
𝐶 13

12. Urn I has 2 white and 3 black balls; Urn II has 4 white and 1 black balls and Urn III has 2 white and 4 black
balls. An urn selected at random and a ball is drawn at random is found to be white. Find the probability
that urn I was selected.
6
Ans: 23
13. The probabilities that a husband and wife will be live 20 years from now are given by 0.8 and 0.9
respectively. Find the probability that in 20 years (a) both (b) neither, (c) at least one will be alive.
14. If A and B are any two events such that 𝑃(𝐵) = 2⁄7 , 𝑃(𝐴 ∪ 𝐵̅ ) = 0.8, then 𝑃(𝐴) =?
3
Ans: 10
15. Suppose that a newly constructed building collapsed. Obtain the probability that it is due to faulty design,
where it is given that the chance of the design being faulty is 0.05. The probability that the building
collapses if the design is faulty is 0.9 and the building collapses for some other reason is 0.55.
Ans: 0.79
1 1
16. If A and B are any two events such that 𝑃 (𝐴  𝐵) = , 𝑃 (𝐴𝐶  𝐵 𝐶 ) = and 𝑃(𝐴) = 𝑃(𝐵) = 𝑝 then
2 3
find the value of p.
1
Ans: 12
17. A box contains 10 pairs of shoes. If eight shoes are randomly selected, what is the probability that there is
(i) No complete pair
(ii) Exactly one complete pair?
10𝐶 8 ×28 10𝐶 1 ×9𝐶 6 ×26
Ans: (i) (ii)
20𝐶 8 20𝐶 8
18. In a bolt factory, machine A, B and C manufacture respectively 25%, 35% and 40% of the total output. Of
their output 5%, 4% and 2% are defective bolts. A bolt is drawn at random from the product and found to
be defective. What is the probability that it was manufactured by machine A, B and C?
25 28 16
Ans: 69 , 69 , 69
19. One ticket is selected at random from 100 tickets numbered 00, 01, 02, … , 99. If X and Y denote the sum and
product of the digit on the tickets respectively, find 𝑃(𝑋 = 9/𝑌 = 0).
9
Ans: 19
20. A and B play a game in which they alternatively toss a pair of dice. The one who is first to get a total of 7
wins the game. Find the probability that
(a) The one who tosses first win the game
(b) The one who tosses second will win the game.
6 5
Ans: (a) 11 (b) 11
21. Prove that: For any two events A1 and A2 (may not be mutually exclusive) P(A1 ∪ A2 ) = P(A1 ) +
P(A2 ) – P(A1 ∩ A2 ).
22. Twenty five books are placed at random in a shelf. Find the probability that a particular pair of books shall
be (i) always together, and (ii) never together.
2 23
Ans: (i) 25 (ii) 25
 7 2
23. From a city population, the probability of selecting (i) a male or a smoker is (ii) a male smoker is 5 and
10
2
(iii) a male, if a smoker is already selected is . Find the probability of selecting (a) a non-smoker (b) a male
3
and (c) a smoker, if a male if first selected.
3 1 4
Ans: (a) 5 (b) 2 (c) 5.
24. There are (𝑁 + 1) identical urns marked 0, 1, 2, … , 𝑁 each of which contains N white and red balls. The 𝑘 𝑡ℎ
urn contains k red balls and 𝑁 − 𝑘 white balls, (𝑘 = 0, 1, … , 𝑁). An urn is chosen at random and n
random drawing of a ball are made from it’s the ball drawn being replaced after each draw. If the balls
drawn are all red, find the probability the next drawing will also yield a red ball.
k n+1
∑N
k=0( )
Ans: N
k n
.
∑N
k=0(N)
25. Find the probability of obtaining
i) Three heads,
ii) At least three heads, and
iii) At most three heads in five throws with a coin.
5 1 13
Ans: i) 16 ii) 2 iii) 16
26. If A and B be two independent events prove that 𝐴𝑐 and 𝐵 𝑐 are also independent.
27. Two urns contain respectively 5 white, 7 black balls and 4 white, 2 black balls. One of urns is selected by
the toss of a fair coin and then 2 balls are drawn without replacement from the selected urn. If both balls
drawn are white, what is the probability that the first urn is selected?
25
Ans: 91
28. A speaks the truth 3 out of 4 times and B 7 times out of 10. They agree in their statement that from a bag
containing 6 balls of different colors a white ball has been drawn. Find the probability that the statement is
true.
35
Ans: 36
29. In a certain class 25% of the students failed in Mathematics, 15% failed in Chemistry, 10% failed in both
Mathematics and Chemistry. A student is selected at random,
i) If he failed in Mathematics, what is the probability that he failed in Chemistry?
ii) If he failed in Chemistry, what is the probability that he failed in Mathematics?
iii) What is the probability that he failed both in Mathematics and Chemistry?
iv) What is the probability that he failed in Mathematics or Chemistry?
2 2 1 3
Ans: i) 5 ii) 3 iii) 10 iv) 10
30. Three balls are drawn successively from the box containing 6 red balls, 4 white balls and 5 blue balls.
Determine the probability that these balls are (a) Red (b) White (c) Blue (d) not red (e) red or white.
4 4 2 87 24
Ans: (a) 91 (b) 455 (c) 91 (d) 91 (e) 455
31. A missile hit target with probability 0.3. How many missile should be fired so that there is at least an 80%
probability of hitting a target?
Ans: 5

32. A and B throws alternatively with a pair of dice. A wins if he throws six before B throws seven and B wins if he
throws seven before A throws six. If A begins, find the probability of A wins the game.
30
Ans: 61