LECTURE 3

INTRODUCTION TO
PROBABILITY AND STATICS

PROBABILITY
FACULTY OF AND STATICS
ENGINEERING AND
TECHNOLOGY
DR.PROF.ABID ALI SHAH
DEPARTMENT OF CIVIL
ENGINEERING
 Lecture-3

Probability

Random Experiment or simply experiment

Tossing a coin is a random experiment. Its possible outcomes are Head or Tail.

Likewise rolling a die is an experiment and its outcome may be 1,2,3,4,5 or 6.

Selecting a card or cards from a deck

Picking a component from a component’s lot.

Sample Space

A sample space is the set of all possible outcomes of a random experiment. It is

denoted by S.
Tossing a coin: S={H, T}

Tossing a coin twice: S={HH, HT, TH, TT}

Tossing a coin three times or three coin tossed simultaneously :
S={HHH, HHT, THH, HTH, TTH, THT, HTT, TTT}
Rolling a die: S={1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6}
Rolling a die twice or two dice rolled simultaneously :
S= {(1,1),(1,2),(1,3),(1,4),(1,5),(1,6),
(2,1),(2,2),(2,3),(2,4),(2,5),(2,6),
(3,1),(3,2),(3,3),(3,4),(3,5),(3,6),
(4,1),(4,2),(4,3),(4,4),(4,5),(4,6),
(5,1),(5,2),(5,3),(5,4),(5,5),(5,6),
(6,1),(6,2),(6,3),(6,4),(6,5),(6,6)}
Event
A subset of a sample space is an event.
In tossing a coin example S={H,T}, the events are

{},{H},{T},{H,T}

The events are usually denoted by letters A, B, C, etc.

Probability of an event

The probability of an event A, denoted by p(A) is defined as

Example-1: A coin is tossed, find the probability of getting i) a head

and ii) a tail.
Solution: Here
S={H, T}
Let A denotes an event of getting a head then A = {H}
 Let B denotes an event of getting a tail B = {T}

Example-2: Three coins are tossed simultaneously. Find the probability of getting
two heads.
Solution S={HHH, HHT, THH, HTH, TTH, THT, HTT, TTT}

Let A denotes an event of getting two heads

A={HHT, THH, HTH}

Set Theory

Sample space
Set S
Events
Subset of S

Let S={1,2,3,4,5,6} then {},{1},{2},{3},{4},{5},{6},

{1,2},{1,3},{1,4},{1,5},{1,6},{2,3}…
{1,2,3},{1,2,4},{1,2,5},{1,2,6}…
{1,2,3,4},….
Let event A={1,2,3} and B={1,3,4,5}, then

A intersection
B
A union B

Complement
of A
Complement of
B
Types of Events

1. Simple Event
If an event has only one sample point of a sample space, it is called a simple event or an
Elementary Event. It is an event that consists of exactly one outcome.
Throwing a die example where
S={1,2,3,4,5,6}
The events: {1},{2},{3},{4},{5},{6} are simple events
2. Compound
Event
If an event has more than one sample point of a sample space, it is called a compound
event.
Throwing a die example where
S={1,2,3,4,5,6}
The events: {1,2},{1,3},{1,4},{1,5},{1,6},{2,3}…
{1,2,3},{1,2,4},{1,2,5},{1,2,6}…
{1,2,3,4},….
are compound events
3. Mutually Exclusive or Disjoint
Events
Two events A and B are mutually exclusive or disjoint if
4. Complimentary Events
For an event A the non-occurrence of the event is called its complimentary event.
Throwing a die example, where
S={1,2,3,4,5,6}
Let A={1,2} then

whereas