In The Name of ALLAH

Yazd University
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Engineering Probability & Statistics
Instructor : Dr. Tadaion
Fall 1391

Problem Set #2

Axioms of Probability
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------1- Let A and B be two events. Prove that : (This is called Bonferronis inequality)

P( A) + P( B) 1

P( AB)
Note : P( AB ) = P( A I B)

2- Which of the following statements is true? If a statement is true, prove it. If it is

false, give a counterexample.
a) If P( A) + P( B) + P (C ) = 1 , then the events A , B , and C are mutually exclusive.
b) If P( A U B U C ) = 1 , then A , B , and C are mutually exclusive events.
3- Let A , B , and C be three events. Prove that :
P( A U B U C ) = P( A) + P( B) + P (C ) P( AB) P( AC ) P( BC ) + P( ABC )

4- Let A , B , and C be three events. Show that exactly two of these events will occur
with the following probability :
P( AB ) + P( AC ) + P( BC ) 3P( ABC )

Note : P( ABC ) = P( A I B I C )
5- Let A1 , A2 , A3 ,K be a sequence of events of a sample space. Prove that :
P

UA

n =1

n =1

P ( An )

This is called Booles inequality.

6- Let A1 , A2 , A3 ,K be a sequence of events of an experiment. Prove that :
P

IA

n =1

1
n =1

P( An )

Hint: Use Booles inequality, discussed in Problem 5.

7- Let A1 , A2 , A3 , K, An be n events. Show that if P( A1 ) = P ( A2 ) = L = P( An ) = 1 , then :

P( A1 A2 L An ) = 1
8- Let A , B , and C be three events. Prove that :

P( A U B U C )

P( A) + P( B ) + P (C )

9- Let A , B , and C be three events. Show that :

P( A U B U C ) = P ( A) + P ( B) + P(C )
If and only if P( AB) = P ( AC ) = P( BC ) = 0
10- Let A and B be two events. The event ( A B) U ( B A) is called the symmetric
difference of A and B and is denoted by A B . Clearly, A B is the event that exactly
one of the two events A and B occurs. Show that :
P ( A B ) = P ( A) + P (B )

2 P ( AB )

11- Prove that :

P ( E U F U G ) = P ( F ) + P ( E ) + P (G ) P ( E FG ) P ( E FG ) P ( EF G ) 2 P ( EFG )

12- Show that :

P( E F ) = P( E ) P ( EF )

13- Use induction to generalize Bonferronis inequality to n events. Namely, show that :
P( E1 E 2 L E n )

P( E1 ) + L + P( E n ) (n 1)

14- A fax transmission can take place at any of three speeds depending on the condition
of the phone connection between the two fax machines. The speeds are high (H) at 14400
bps, medium (M) at 9600 bps, and low (L) at 4800 bps. In response to requests for
information, a company sends either short faxes of two (T) pages, or long faxes of four
(F) pages. Consider the experiment of monitoring a fax transmission and observing the
transmission speed and length. An observation is a two-letter word, for example, a highspeed, two-page fax is HT.
(a) What is the sample space of the experiment?
(b) Let A1 be the event "medium-speed fax". What are the outcomes in A1 ?
(c) Let A2 be the event "short (two-page) fax". What are the outcomes in A2 ?
(d) Let A3 be the event "high-speed fax or low-speed fax". What are the outcomes in

A3 ?
(e) Are A , A2 , and A3 mutually exclusive?

15- Computer programs are classified by the length of the source code and by the
execution time. Programs with more than 150 lines in the source code are big (B).
Programs with 150 lines are little (L). Fast programs (F) run in less than 0.1 seconds.
Slow programs (W) require at least 0.1 seconds. Monitor a program executed by a
computer. Observe the length of the source code and the run time. The probability
model for this experiment contains the following information: P( LF ) = 0.5 , P( BF ) = 0.2 ,
and P( BW ) = 0.2 . What is the sample space of the experiment? Calculate the following
probabilities:
(a) P(W )
(b) P(B)
(c) P(W U B )
16- There are two types of cellular phones, handheld phones (H) that you carry and
mobile phones (M) that are mounted in vehicles. Phone calls can be classified by the
traveling speed of the user as fast (F) or slow (W). Monitor a cellular phone call and
observe the type of telephone and the speed of the user. The probability model for this
experiment has the following information: P( F ) = 0.5 , P( HF ) = 0.2 , P( MW ) = 0.1 .
What is the sample space of the experiment? Calculate the following probabilities:
(a) P(W )
(b) P(MF )
(c) P(H )
17- Mobile telephones perform handoffs as they move from cell to cell. During a call, a
telephone either performs zero handoffs ( H 0 ) , one handoff ( H 1 ) , or more than one
handoff ( H 2 ) . In addition, each call is either long (L), if it lasts more than three
minutes, or brief (B). The following table describes the probabilities of the possible types
of calls.

L
B

(H 0 )
0.1
0.4

(H1 )
0.1
0.1

(H 2 )
0.2
0.1

What is the probability P( H 0 ) that a phone makes no handoffs? What is the probability
a call is brief? What is the probability a call is long or there are at least two handoffs?
18- Two integers m and n are called relatively prime if 1 is their only common positive
divisor. Thus 8 and 5 are relatively prime, whereas 8 and 6 are not. A number is selected
at random from the set {1, 2, 3, . . . , 63}. Find the probability that it is relatively prime
to 63.
19- There are n people gathered in a room.
(a) What is the probability that two (at least) have the same birthday? Calculate the
probability for n = 22 and 23.
(b) What is the probability that at least one has the same birthday as you? What value of
n makes it close to 1/2?

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------"Good Luck"
Gathered by : Mohammad Hossein Mohammadian Sarcheshmeh (TA)
TA's Email : mohammadian63@yahoo.com