.11
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We'd like to know the likelihood that any 5 people chosen from 20 will be left-handed if the probability of being left-handed is assumed to be 10%. Well, 5 people can be chosen from 20 in (20 C 5) = 15504 ways. So, we have (15504)*(.1^5)*(.9^15) = 3.19%. This is a Binomial probability problem, where we are interested in 'k' successes (k = 5, success --> people being left-handed) in 'n' trials (n = 20).
The probability is approx 0.81
very high, that is only slightly higher than average.
If the probability of a person being left handed is .11, then the probability of a person being right handed is .89 (1.00 - .11). In a class of 40 people, there are 40! (40 factorial) = 40 x 39 x 38 x .... x 3 x 2 x 1 possible Permutations of students. Within this number, there are many that will yield exactly 5 left handed people. 40-P-5 is the number of Permutations of 5 within a class of 40 (sorry, can't use the correct formating here!): = 40! / (40 - 5) ! = 40! / 35! = 40 x 39 x 38 x 37 x 36 Since we don't care about order..... we need to factor out the number of identical permutations. 40-C-5 = 40-P-5 / 5! So.... (40 x 39 x 38 x 37 x 36) / (5 x 4 x 3 x 2 x 1) = 658,008 Now, what is the probability of any one such combination? (.89 to the power 35) x (.11 to the power 5) = 0.000000273 So the probability of exactly 5 left handed people in the class is 658,008 x .000000273 = 17.9408137 %
left ventricle