• Congratulations to the Class of 2024 on your results!
    Let us know how you went here
    Got a question about your uni preferences? Ask us here

Probability (1 Viewer)

Sindivyn

Member
Joined
Mar 4, 2012
Messages
194
Gender
Male
HSC
2012
I have a feeling this is completely wrong and illegitimate, but anyway.
Set a date in a year for one birthday.
Probability of everyone NOT sharing that birthday = (364/365)^22
Now, this event repeats 22 more times (setting each person).
= ((364/365)^22)23
= 0.22495.....
Therefore conjugate (that is, sharing birthdays) is 1-0.2495
=0.75047... which is greater than the chance of none of the people sharing birthdays.

Most likely completely wrong but meh

Currently working on an alternate method (realized a mistake)
Alternate (seems more legit)
Set 1 date in the year for one person
P(no shared dates) = (364!/342! divided by (365)^22) Having trouble inputting that into the calculator, so not sure if it's <0.5.

Edit: online scientific calculator showed it to be 0.4927.... Therefore the probability of shared dates = 1-0.4927 = 0.5073.
That is, probability of a shared date > probability of no shared dates.
Is this right?
 
Last edited:

seanieg89

Well-Known Member
Joined
Aug 8, 2006
Messages
2,662
Gender
Male
HSC
2007
I have a feeling this is completely wrong and illegitimate, but anyway.
Set a date in a year for one birthday.
Probability of everyone NOT sharing that birthday = (364/365)^22
Now, this event repeats 22 more times (setting each person).
= ((364/365)^22)23
= 0.22495.....
Therefore conjugate (that is, sharing birthdays) is 1-0.2495
=0.75047... which is greater than the chance of none of the people sharing birthdays.

Most likely completely wrong but meh

Currently working on an alternate method (realized a mistake)
Alternate (seems more legit)
Set 1 date in the year for one person
P(no shared dates) = (364!/342! divided by (365)^22) Having trouble inputting that into the calculator, so not sure if it's <0.5.

Edit: online scientific calculator showed it to be 0.4927.... Therefore the probability of shared dates = 1-0.4927 = 0.5073.
That is, probability of a shared date > probability of no shared dates.
Is this right?
Yep your second method is correct. Incidentally, this is a fantastic bet to make at a party. People who are non-mathematical seem to find it counter-intuitive and when you have say 30 people in the room, the probability jumps to >70%.
 

Shadowdude

Cult of Personality
Joined
Sep 19, 2009
Messages
12,145
Gender
Male
HSC
2010
Yep your second method is correct. Incidentally, this is a fantastic bet to make at a party. People who are non-mathematical seem to find it counter-intuitive and when you have say 30 people in the room, the probability jumps to >70%.
make dat cash money :p
 

Sindivyn

Member
Joined
Mar 4, 2012
Messages
194
Gender
Male
HSC
2012
Yep your second method is correct. Incidentally, this is a fantastic bet to make at a party. People who are non-mathematical seem to find it counter-intuitive and when you have say 30 people in the room, the probability jumps to >70%.
Yeah, I subbed in the wrong value at first and got something like 0.9 chance. I would hate to get this question in a test though, kept on getting math errors on my calculator because of the permutations :p.
 

Users Who Are Viewing This Thread (Users: 0, Guests: 1)

Top