A new illustration for when I teach independence in probability. The math quote begins at about the 47-second mark of the video.
Tag: conditional probability
My Favorite One-Liners: Part 93
In this series, I’m compiling some of the quips and one-liners that I’ll use with my students to hopefully make my lessons more memorable for them.
This is a wisecrack that I’ll use in my probability/statistics classes to clarify the difference between and
:
Even though the odds of me being shot by some idiot wielding a gun while I teach my class are probably a million to one, I’ve decided, in light of Texas’ campus-carry law, to get my concealed handgun license and carry my own gun to class. This is for my own safety and protection; after all, the odds of *two* idiots carrying a gun to my class must be absolutely microscopic.
See also my previous post for more of the background for this wisecrack.
My Favorite One-Liners: Part 26
In this series, I’m compiling some of the quips and one-liners that I’ll use with my students to hopefully make my lessons more memorable for them.
Here’s a problem that could appear early in a probability class:
Let
,
, and
. Find
.
The standard technique for solving this problem involves first finding using the Addition Rule:
From here, the Multiplication Rule can be used (or, equivalently, the definition of a conditional probability):
So far, so good.
Now let me add a small twist to the original problem that creates a small difficulty when solving:
Let
,
, and
. Find
.
Proceeding as before, we obtain
The value of $P(A \cup B)$ is obvious. But how do we evaluate the left side?
If I’m teaching an advanced probability class, I might expect them to use DeMorgan’s Laws. However, it’s a whole lot easier to reason out the left hand side: I’m looking for the probability that both and
happen or else at least one of
and
happen. Well, that’s clearly redundant: if both
and
happen, then certainly at least one of
and
happen.
Here’s my one-liner, which I say, if possible, using only one breath of air:
Clearly, this is redundant. It’s like saying Dr. Q is my professor and he’s a total stud. It’s redundant. It’s obvious. There’s no need to actually say it.
After the laughter settles from this bit of braggadocio, the can be safely dropped from the left side:
However, I need to emphasize that dropping the term on the left side is a special feature of this particular problem since one set was a subset of the other, and that students shouldn’t expect to always be able to do this when computing conditional probabilities.