What is the probability of flipping a penny and it does not land on heads or tails?

Answer 1

Since there are the only two mutually exclusive possibilities, we could say the answer is zero.
But in reality, a penny could land on its edge.

For this answer we must leave Answers.com and travel through another dimension -- a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind. A journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of imagination. That's a signpost up ahead: your next stop: The Twilight Zone!


The episode was called "A Penny for Your Thoughts" (Season 2, episode 25 staring Dick York)

The Opening narration of that episode goes as follows:

Mr. Hector B. Poole, resident of the Twilight Zone. Flip a coin and keep flipping it. What are the odds? Half the time it will come up heads, half the time tails. But in one freakish chance in a million, it'll land on its edge. Mr. Hector B. Poole, a bright human coin, on his way to the bank.

The man flips a coin, it lands on edge, and he discovers that he's mysteriously become telepathic. At the end of the episode, he knocks the coin over and the telepathy goes away.


In reality, mathematicians have tried to figure this out as have physicists. The answer depends on the exact size and width of the edge of the penny, and many other factors. One this is for sure, Rod Serling was not far off when he guessed one in a million.

Nickels have a larger chance of landing on their edge since they have a larger edge and probability of an American nickel landing on edge is approximately 1 in 6000 tosses by one source. The work is not all shown and I don't believe it has been duplicated.

So I don't think there is an exact answer to your question, but the probability certainly is somewhere between 0 and a number very close to 0. It is statistically insignificant.

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