University of Northeastern Philippines

School of Graduate Studies

Iriga City

Name: MELANIE JOY R. CRISPINO

Course: MAED-MAJOR IN ADMINISTRATION AND SUPERVISION
Professor: MARIA P. DELA VEGA, Ph.D.
Subject: INFERENTIAL STATICS
Topic: FUNDAMENTAL THEORIES OF PROBABILITY

People use the term probability many times each day. For example, physician says that a patient has a
50-50 chance of surviving a certain operation. Another physician may say that she is 95% certain that a
patient has a particular disease.

Fundamental Theories of Probability

What is probability?

The word  probability  has several meanings in ordinary conversation. Two of these are particularly
important for the development and applications of the mathematical theory of probability. One is the
interpretation of probabilities as  relative frequencies, for which simple games involving coins, cards,
dice, and roulette wheels provide examples. 

For example, the statement that the probability of “heads” in tossing a coin equals one-half, according
to the relative frequency interpretation, implies that in a large number of tosses the relative frequency
with which “heads” actually occurs will be approximately one-half, although it contains no implication
concerning the outcome of any given toss.

Suppose you ask a subject to guess, before it is flipped, whether a coin will land with heads or tails up.
Assuming the coin is fair (has the same probability of heads and tails), the chance of guessing correctly
is 50%, so you'd expect half the guesses to be correct and half to be wrong. So, if we ask the subject to
guess heads or tails for each of 100 coin flips, we'd expect about 50 of the guesses to be correct.

The chance that something will happen. How likely it is that some event will occur.

Sometimes we can measure a probability with a number like "10% chance", or we can use words such as
impossible, unlikely, possible, even chance, likely and certain.
IMPOSSIBLE-- This means that something has absolutely no chance of happening. If I had only 3
red marbles in a bag, then it would be impossible for me to pull a blue marble out of the bag. 

CERTAIN-- This means that something definitely will happen, without a doubt. If someone pushes
me into a pool, then it is certain that I will get wet. 

LIKELY-- This means that something probably will happen. You couldn't promise that it would
happen for sure, but you could say that you think it would happen. If I played a trumpet in a room
full of sleeping people, then it is likely that they would wake up. 

UNLIKELY-- This means that something probably won't happen. It might happen, but usually it will
not. My dad wakes up very early almost every morning. It is unlikely that he would ever sleep til
noon. 

Example: "It is unlikely to rain tomorrow". As a number, probability is from 0 (impossible) to 1

(certain).

There are many similar examples involving groups of people, molecules of a gas, genes, and so
on. Actuarial statements about the  life expectancy  for persons of a certain age describe the collective
experience of a large number of individuals but do not purport to say what will happen to any particular
person. Similarly, predictions about the chance of a genetic disease occurring in a child of parents having
a known genetic makeup are statements about relative frequencies of occurrence in a large number of
cases but are not predictions about a given individual.

Terminologies to Understand What is Probability

Random Experiment:  Those experiments, (conducted in identical situations), in which the outcomes are
the same in each trail but its prediction is uncertain. The experiment in which the total numbers of
outcomes are the same in all cases but the occurrence of the outcome is unpredictable is random.

Before rolling a die you do not know the result. This is an example of a random experiment. In
particular, a random experiment is a process by which we observe something uncertain. After the
experiment, the result of the random experiment is known. An outcome is a result of a random
experiment. The set of all possible outcomes is called the sample space. Thus in the context of a
random experiment, the sample space is our universal set. Here are some examples of random
experiments and their sample spaces:

When we repeat a random experiment several times, we call each one of them a trial. Thus, a trial is a
particular performance of a random experiment. In the example of tossing a coin, each trial will result
in either heads or tails. Note that the sample space is defined based on how you define your random
experiment.

Example: We toss a coin three times and observe the sequence of heads/tails. The sample space here
may be defined as

S={(H,H,H),(H,H,T),(H,T,H),(T,H,H),(H,T,T),(T,H,T),(T,T,H),(T,T,T)}.

Explanation: Our goal is to assign probability to certain events. For example, suppose that we would
like to know the probability that the outcome of rolling a fair die is an even number. In this case, our
event is the set E= {2,4,6}. If the result of our random experiment belongs to the set E, we say that the
event E has occurred. Thus an event is a collection of possible outcomes. In other words, an event is a
subset of the sample space to which we assign a probability. Although we have not yet discussed how
to find the probability of an event, you might be able to guess that the probability of {2,4,6} is 50
percent which is the same as 12 in the probability theory convention.

Outcome: The various possible results of a random experiment.

Example: A spinner has 4 equal sectors colored yellow, blue, green and red. What are the chances of
landing on blue after spinning the spinner? What are the chances of landing on red?

Solution:  The chances of landing on blue are 1 in 4, or one fourth.

The chances of landing on red are 1 in 4, or one fourth.

This problem asked us to find some probabilities involving a spinner.

An outcome is the result of a single trial of an experiment.

Answer: The possible outcomes are landing on yellow, blue, green or red.

Explanation:

Sample space is all the possible outcomes of an event.

Sometimes the sample space is easy to determine. For example, if you roll a dice, 6 things could
happen. You could roll a 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6.

Sometimes sample space is more difficult to determine, so you can make a tree diagram or a list to
help you figure out all the possible outcomes.

Sample Point: Each element of the sample space or each outcome of a random experiment.

Example: choosing a card from a deck

There are 52 cards in a deck (not including Jokers)

So there are 52 Sample Points: {Ace of Hearts, 2 of Hearts, etc... }

Note: "King" is not a sample point. There are 4 Kings, so that is 4 different sample points.

Event: A subset of a sample space is an event.

Sure Event: The event which is certain to occur or the whole sample space.

Impossible Event: An empty set is an impossible event.

Complimentary Event: The non-happening of the event A is complimentary of the event A. It is

denoted by A’. A’ = 1 – A. If A represents the success, then A’ represents the failure.

Basic Features of Probability

The probability ranges from 0 to 1. 1: a certain result; 0: impossibility; and various in-between values
measure the uncertainty.

P [sum of all possible events] = 1.

P [sum of events] = Sum of probabilities of events.

THEORIES:

1. Equally Likely Outcomes - This theory of probability is the oldest. It originated in the study of
games of chance, such as dice games and card games. In the Theory of Equally Likely Outcomes,
probability assignments depend on the assertion that no particular outcome is preferred over
any other by Nature; generally, arguments that Nature should show no preference among the
outcomes appeal to the symmetry of the system studied (such as a "fair" coin or die).

For example, if a coin is balanced well, there is no reason for it to land heads in preference to
tails when it is tossed vigorously, so according to the Theory of Equally Likely Outcomes, the
probability that the coin lands heads is equal to the probability that the coin lands tails, and
both are 100%/2 = 50%. (This ignores the nearly impossible outcomes that the coin does not
land at all or lands balanced on its edge.) Similarly, if a die is fair (properly balanced) the
chance that when it is rolled vigorously it lands with the side with one spot on top (the chance
that the die shows one spot) is the same as the chance that it shows two spots or three spots
or four spots or five spots or six spots: 100%/6, about 16.7%.

Another example, getting a 3 on the toss of a die and getting a 5 on the toss of a die are  equally
likely events, since the probabilities of each event are equal. Getting an even number on the
toss of a die and getting an odd number on the toss of a die are equally likely events, since the
probabilities of each event are equal.
 If an event consists of more than one possible outcome, the chance of the event is the number
of ways it can occur, divided by the total number of things that could occur. For example, the
chance that a die lands showing an even number of spots is the number of ways it could land
showing an even number of spots (3, namely, landing showing 2, 4, or 6 spots), divided by the
total number of things that could occur (6, namely, landing showing 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6 spots).
Since the total number of possible outcomes is n, the maximum possible probability of any
event is 100%×n/n = 100%. Thus, in the Theory of Equally Likely Outcomes, probabilities are
between 0% and 100%, as claimed.

2. In the Frequency Theory of Probability, probability is the limit of the relative frequency with
which an event occurs in repeated trials.   Relative frequencies are always between 0% (the event
essentially never happens) and 100% (the event essentially always happens), so in this theory as
well, probabilities are between 0% and 100%.

According to the Frequency Theory of Probability, what it means to say that "the probability
that A occurs is p%" is that if you repeat the experiment over and over again, independently
and under essentially identical conditions, the percentage of the time that A occurs will
converge to p. For example, under the Frequency Theory, to say that the chance that a coin
lands heads is 50% means that if you toss the coin over and over again, independently, the
ratio of the number of times the coin lands heads to the total number of tosses approaches a
limiting value of 50% as the number of tosses grows. Because the ratio of heads to tosses is
always between 0% and 100%, when the probability exists it must be between 0% and 100%.

3. In the Subjective Theory of Probability, probability measures the speaker's "degree of belief"
that the event will occur, on a scale of 0% (complete disbelief that the event will happen) to
100% (certainty that the event will happen).

According to the Subjective Theory, what it means for me to say that "the probability
that A occurs is 2/3" is that I believe that A will happen twice as strongly as I believe
that A will not happen. The Subjective Theory is particularly useful in assigning meaning to the
probability of events that in principle can occur only once. For example, how might one assign
meaning to a statement like "there is a 25% chance of an earthquake on the San Andreas fault
with magnitude 8 or larger before 2050?" It is very hard to use either the Theory of Equally
Likely Outcomes or the Frequency Theory to make sense of the assertion.