EE3110 - Probability Foundations for Electrical Engineers

Tutorial - 2

1. Suppose a test for COVID is 99% accurate in both directions (positive and negative) and 0.3% of the
population is COVID positive. If someone tests positive, what is the probability they actually are
COVID positive? Justify why you are getting a low probability even though the test appears to be very
accurate.
2. We throw 3 dice one by one. What is the probability that we obtain 3 numbers in strictly increasing
order?
3. A coin is tossed twice. Harshith claims that the event of two heads is at least as likely if we know that
the first toss is a head than if we know that at least one of the tosses is a head. Is he right? Does it
make a difference if the coin is fair or unfair? How can we generalize Harshith’s reasoning?
4. Let A and B be events with P(A) > 0 and P(B) > 0. We say that an event B suggests an event A if
P(A|B) > P(A), and does not suggest event A if P(A|B) < P(A).
1. Show that B suggests A if and only if A suggests B.
2. Show that B suggests A if and only if B c does not suggest A. Assume that P(B c ) > 0.
3. We know that a treasure is located in one of two places, with probabilities β and 1 − β, respectively,
where 0 < β < 1. We search the first place and if the treasure is there, we find it with probability
p > 0. Show that the event of not finding the treasure in the first place suggests that the treasure
is in the second place.

5. For events A, B and C with C ⊆ B and P (A)P (B)P (C) > 0, P (A|B) = αP (A|B ∩ C) + (1 − α)P (A|B ∩
C c ). Find α in terms of P (A), P (B) and P (C).
6. A large class in probability theory is taking a multiple-choice test. For a particular question on the test,
the fraction of examinees who know the answer is p; 1 − p is the fraction that will guess. The probability
of answering a question correctly is unity for an examinee who knows the answer and 1/m for a guesser;
m is the number of multiple choice alternatives. Compute the probability that an examinee knew the
answer to a question, given that he or she has answered it correctly.
7. The prisoner’s dilemma: The release of two out of three prisoners has been announced, but their identity
is kept secret. One of the prisoners considers asking a friendly guard to tell him who is the prisoner
other than himself that will be released, but hesitates based on the following rationale: at the prisoner’s
present state of knowledge, the probability of being released is 32 , but after he knows the answer, the
probability of being released will become 12 , since there will be two prisoners (including himself) whose
fate is unknown and exactly one of the two will be released. What is wrong with this line of reasoning?
8. (a) Consider the following 7-door version of the Monty Hall problem. There are 7 doors, behind one of
which there is a car (which you want), and behind the rest of which there are goats (which you don’t
want). Initially, all possibilities are equally likely for where the car is. You choose a door. Monty Hall
then opens 3 goat doors, and offers you the option of switching to any of the remaining 3 doors.

Assume that Monty Hall knows which door has the car, will always open 3 goat doors and offer the
option of switching, and that Monty chooses with equal probabilities from all his choices of which goat
doors to open. Should you switch? What is your probability of success if you switch to one of the
remaining 3 doors?

(b) Generalize the above to a Monty Hall problem where there are n ≥ 3 doors, of which Monty opens
m goat doors, with 1 ≤ m ≤ n − 2.
 9. To encourage Elmer’s promising tennis career, his father offers him a prize if he wins (at least) two
tennis sets in a row in a three-set series to be played with his father and the club champion alternately:
father–champion–father or champion–father–champion, according to Elmer’s choice. The champion is a
better player than Elmer’s father. Which series should Elmer choose?
10. Alice searches for her term paper in her filing cabinet, which has several drawers. She knows that she
left her term paper in drawer j with probability pj > 0. The drawers are so messy that even if the paper
is present in drawer i, the probability that she finds it is only di .
Alice unsuccessfully searches in a particular drawer i. Conditioned on this event, find the probability
that the paper is in drawer j for: (a) j ̸= i, (b) j = i.
11. You are taking out candies one by one from a jar that has 10 red candies, 20 blue candies, and 30 green
candies in it. What is the probability that there are at least 1 blue candy and 1 green candy left in the
jar when you have taken out all the red candies?
12. Consider a coin that comes up heads with probability p and tails with probability 1 − p. Let qn be the
probability that after n independent tosses, there have been an even number of heads. Derive a recursion
that relates qn to qn−1 , and solve this recursion to establish the formula

1 + (1 − 2p)n
qn = .
2

13. A line of 100 airline passengers is waiting to board a plane. They each hold a ticket to one of the 100
seats on that flight. For convenience, let’s say that the n-th passenger in line has a ticket for seat number
n. Being drunk, the first person in line picks a random seat (equally likely for each seat). All of the other
passengers are sober, and will go to their assigned seats unless it is already occupied; If it is occupied,
they will then find a free seat to sit in, at random. What is the probability that the last (100th) person
to board the plane will sit in their own seat?
14. There are N urns of which the r-th urn contains r − 1 red balls and N − r blue balls. You pick an urn
at random and remove two balls at random without replacement. Find the probability that
(a) the second ball is blue.
(b) the second ball is blue, given that the first is blue.
15. Gambler’s Ruin. Suppose you play a game by tossing a fair coin repeatedly and independently. If it
comes up heads, you win a dollar, and if it comes up tails, you lose a dollar. Suppose you start with
$50. What is the probability you will get to $200 without first getting ruined (running out of money)?

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