A group of 4 boys and 2 girls are going to sit together in a row of 6 theater seats. If they seat themselves randomly.....

What is the probability the boys will be seated together and the girls will be seated together?




Also,


The probability that Ann will go to the beach this summer is 0.4 and the probability that she will go to the mountains is 0.5. The probability she does both is .25.....


What is the probability that she doesn't go to either place?

3/23/2006 4:41:16 PM

Sure you had tdub to help you now, but what about in real life when you see a group of 6 people about to sit down. What will you do? How will you ever get on with your life if you don't know the answers to these no impact whatsoever life changing questions?

Maybe with Ann if you want to surprise her on your anniversary and you don't know where she’s going, and all you have is a note she left expressing her love and some equations expressing the probability of the location she will be at, its a little more practical.

3/23/2006 4:52:30 PM

ok, so uhhhhh. whats the answer?

3/23/2006 4:56:58 PM

The answer is get a humanities degree that can help you answer questions on life, religion, family, & help you be informed of great literary works like the Inferno, and the Tempest, and great philosophy like the Republic & Confessions, instead of having a math/engineering degree and worrying about the probability of where people will sit at the theater.

3/23/2006 5:08:07 PM

well my answer for you is that you are a loser for thinking up something that difficult to write in this little thread in order to make me feel bad that i dont know how to solve this problem. If you know how to solve this problem, please, educate me with a math answer instead of your philosophical bull shit.

3/23/2006 5:11:01 PM

“order to make me feel bad that i dont know how to solve this problem”

That wasn’t my intent. I apologize if I made you feel bad. Its just so often the case on thewolfweb that people claim humanities is worthless & math/sci/engineering is the way to go that I relished the chance to make the opposite argument.

I actually believe that studies in all areas of academics are important and that no degrees are worthless.

I probably can’t do the problems, but I’ll try my hand at it to make up for any hard feelings my taking of the devil’s advocate for humanities position may have caused.

[Edited on March 23, 2006 at 5:24 PM. Reason : .]

3/23/2006 5:20:56 PM

Hilarity at its best... Very nice, Supplanter. *golf clap*

Anyway, I'm guessing you're in MA 114. Did you read Jenn's newsletter? It typically has the general way of solving these problems. Particularly that second question.

3/23/2006 5:30:24 PM

Let A = Ann will go to the beach
Let B = Ann will go to the mountains

P(A) = 0.4
P(B)= 0.5

P(A and B) = .25

Then use P(A or B) = P(A) + P(B) - P(A and B)
then take the complement of this answer.

3/23/2006 5:38:20 PM

awesome, i got that one, now I just need to figure out how to do the 4 boys, 2 girls problem...


where can I find that newsletter???

3/23/2006 5:41:49 PM

for the first question i got 2/15

3/23/2006 5:43:57 PM

saweet, can you tell me how you got that?

3/23/2006 5:44:48 PM

I had MA 114 my freshman year. I think I got an A+ in it. Alot of good it did me. Heres how I got the answer that I came up with

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3/23/2006 5:50:21 PM

thanks alot

3/23/2006 6:01:37 PM

Even though you already have your answers, here's a link to the newsletter:

http://www4.ncsu.edu/~jlgeorge/newsletter/newsletter_index.html

3/23/2006 6:06:28 PM