University of the Witwatersrand

Physics III (PHYS3002)

Statistical Physics Q&A

Questions
1. A bag contains 50 marbles. There are 20 red marbles, and the remainder of the
marbles are blue. Ten marbles are removed from the bag in sequence, and each time
a marble is removed it is replaced in the bag. Of the ten marbles chosen, five are red,
and five are blue. Find the probability of this sequence occurring. (Justify which
probability distribution you are using, if any).

2. The following data have been determined for mushrooms growing in the deepest
parts of the Northern Cape forests, in South Africa. In terms of colour, 20% are red,
50% are brown, and the remainder of the mushrooms are white. In terms of toxicity,
20% of the red mushrooms are poisonous, while 5% of those that are not red are also
poisonous if ingested. A person suffered from food poisoning after eating mushrooms
gathered in the forest. What is the probability that the mushroom that poisoned him
is not red? Use Bayes’ Theorem, or a set representation, or both, to answer this
question.

3. The Benford probability distribution describes the probability that a number

containing several digits starts with the digit n. A good example is the list of the
populations of the countries of the world. The probability distribution is given by:
1
𝑃(𝑛) − log10 [1 + ]
𝑛
Where 𝑛 = 1,2, … 9.

a. Show that the Benford Distribution is properly normalized.

b. What is the most likely value for n? Briefly explain your answer.
c. Calculate the mean value for this discrete probability distribution.
Answers
1. In the scenario described in this question, a marble is replaced after each trial. We can
use the Binomial Distribution (BD) because each trial is statistically independent. Since
there are a total of 50 marbles, 20 of which are red, the probability of drawing a red
20
marble in each trial is 𝑝 = 50 . We want the probability of drawing 5 red balls in 10
2
trials (order not important) and so 𝑁 = 10, 𝑛 = 5 and 𝑝 = .
5

Using the BD we obtain:

𝑁!
𝑃𝑁 (𝑛) = 𝑛!(𝑁−𝑛)! 𝑝𝑛 (1 − 𝑝)𝑁−𝑛
10!
= (0.4)5 (0.6)5
5!5!

∴ 𝑃𝑁 (𝑛) = 0.2 𝑜𝑟 20%

2. Suppose we have 100 mushrooms. 20 will be red, and 80 will be not red (brown or
white), as shown in the diagram below.

Not red 80 x 0.05

80
4

Toxic
20 x 0.20
Red 20 4

Of the 20 red mushrooms, 4 will be toxic (20%), and of the 80 not red mushrooms, 4
will be toxic (5%). The total number of toxic mushrooms is therefore 8. The probability
of a mushroom being not red, given that it is toxic, is therefore,
4
𝑃(𝑅̅|𝑇) = = 0.5 𝑜𝑟 50%
8

3. –
a. In order for the Benford distribution to be normalized:
9 9
1
∑ 𝑃 (𝑛) = 1 ⇒ ∑ log10 (1 + ) = 1
𝑛
𝑛=1 𝑛=1
 It follows that for the sum:
9 9
1 𝑛+1
∑ log10 (1 + ) = log10 ∏
𝑛 𝑛
𝑛=1 𝑛=1

Now, for the product:

9
𝑛 + 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
∏ = × × × × × × × × = 10
𝑛 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
𝑛=1
9
1
∴ ∑ log10 (1 + ) = log10 10 = 1
𝑛
𝑛=1

b. By inspection we see that n = 1 is the most probable value; this is shown in

the sequence in the last line of the answer to part (a).

c. The mean value for the distribution is given by the following expression (NB
pay attention to use of logarithms):

1 1 𝑛 𝑛+1 𝑛
𝑛̅ = ∑∞ 9 9 9
𝑛=1 𝑛𝑃(𝑛 ) = ∑𝑛=1 𝑛𝑙𝑜𝑔10 (1 + 𝑛 ) = ∑𝑛=1 𝑙𝑜𝑔10 (1 + 𝑛 ) = log 10 ∏𝑛=1 ( )
𝑛

The product can be evaluated as follows:

𝑛+1 𝑛 2 3 2 4 3 5 4 6 5 7 6 8 7 9 8 10 9 109
∏9𝑛=1 ( ) = 1 × (2) × (3) × (4) × (5) × (6) × (7) × (8) × ( 9 ) =
𝑛 9!

The mean value for the Benford distribution is therefore,

109
𝑛̅ = log10 = 3.44
9!