Mosteller’s Fifty Challenging Problems in Probability

17/216 or 0.079
A drawer contains red socks and black socks. When two
socks are drawn at random, the probability that both are Mr. Brown always bets a dollar on the number 13 at a
red is 1/2. (a) How small can the number of socks in the roulette against the advice of Kind Friend. To help cure Mr.
drawer be? (b) How small if the number of black socks is Brown of playing roulette, Kind Friend always bets Brown
even? $20 at even money that Brown will be behind at the end of
36 plays. How is the cure working?
4, 21 (Most American roulette wheels have 38 equally likely
numbers. If the player’s number comes up, he is paid 35
To encourage Elmer’s promising tennis career, his father times his stake and gets his original stake back;
offers him a prize if he wins (at least) two tennis sets in a otherwise, he loses his stake.)
row in a three-set series to be played with his father and
the club champion alternately: father-champion-father or Not working, Mr. Brown gains +4.68 – 1.89
champion-father-champion, according to Elmer’s choice. = +2.79 dollars per 36 trials
The champion is a better player than Elmer’s father.
Which series should Elmer choose? We often read of someone wo has been dealt 13 spades
at bridge. With a well-shuffled pack of cards, what is the
father-champion-father 0.384 chance that you are dealt a perfect hand (13 of one suit)?
champion-father-champion 0.512 (Bridge is played with an ordinary pack of 52 cards, 13 in
each of 4 suits, and each of 4 players is dealt 13.)
A three-man jury has two members each of whom
independently has probability p of making the correct 4×13!39!/52!
decision and a third member who flips a coin for each
decision (majority rules). A one-man jury has a probability The game of craps, played with two dice, is one of
p of making the correct decision. Which jury has the America’s fastest and most popular gambling games.
better probability of making the correct decision? Calculating the odds associated with it is an instructive
exercise.
Both the jury have the same probability The rules are these. Only totals for the two dice count. The
player throws the dice and wins at once if the total for the
On the average, how many times must a die be thrown first throw is 7 or 11, loses at once if it is 2, 3, or 12. Any
until one gets a 6? other throw is called his “point.” If the first throw is a point,
the player throws the dice repeatedly until he either wins
6 by throwing his point again or loses by throwing 7. What is
the player’s chance to win?
In a common carnival game, a player tosses a penny from
a distance of about 5 feet onto the surface of a table ruled 0.27071
in 1-inch squares. If the penny (3/4 inch in diameter) falls
entirely inside a square, the player receives 5 cents but Three prisoners, A, B, and C, with apparently equally good
does not get his penny back; otherwise, he loses his records have applied for parole. The parole board has
penny. If the penny lands on the table, what is his chance decided to release two of the three, and the prisoners
to win? If the 1-inch square is made smaller by thickening know this but not which two. A warder friend of prisoner A
the lines to 1/16 in wide, what is his chance to win? knows who are to be released. Prisoner A realizes that it
would be unethical to ask the warder if he, A, is to be
1/16,1/28 released, but thinks of asking for the name of one prisoner
other than himself who is to be released He thinks that
Chuck-a-Luck is a gambling game often played at before he asks, his chances of release are 2/3. He thinks
carnivals and gabling houses. A player may bet on any one that if the warder says, "B will be released," his own
of the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Three dice are rolled. If the chances have now gone down to 1/2, because either A
player’s number appears on one, two, or three of the dice, and B or B and C are to be released. And so, A decides not
he receives respectively one, two, or three times his to reduce his chances by asking. However, A is mistaken
original stake plus his own money back; otherwise, he in his calculations Explain.
loses his stake. What is the player’s expected loss per unit
stake? (Actually, the player may distribute stakes on 2/3
several numbers, but each such stake can be regarded as
a separate bet.)
Coupons in cereal boxes are numbered 1 to 5, and a set example, 3 and 2. If ballots are randomly drawn and
of one of each is required for a prize. With one coupon per tallied, what is the chance that at least once after the first
box, how many boxes on average are required to make a tally the candidates have the same number of tallies?
complete set? 2b/(a+b)=4/5

137/12 or 11.42 Players A and B match pennies N times. They keep a tally
of their gains and losses. After the first toss, what is the
Eight eligible bachelors and seven beautiful models chance that at no time during the game will they be even.
happen randomly to have purchased single seats in the
same 15-seat row of a theater. On the average, how many (N n)/2^N
pairs of adjacent seats are ticketed for marriageable
couples? If a chord is selected at random on a fixed circle what is
the probability that its length exceeds the radius of the
8/15 circle?

A tennis tournament has 8 players. The number a player No definite answer: 0.866, 0.75, 0.667
draws from a hat decides his first-round rung in the
tournament ladder. Suppose that the best player always Duels in the town of Discretion are rarely fatal. There,
defeats the next best and that the latter always defeats each contestant comes at a random moment between 5
all the rest. The loser of the finals gets the runner-up cup. A.M. and 6 A.M. on the appointed day and leaves exactly
What is the chance that the second-best player wins the 5 minutes later, honor served, unless his opponent arrives
runner-up cup? within the time interval and then they fight. What fraction
of duels lead to violence?
4/7
1/6
(a) Suppose King Arthur holds a jousting tournament
where the jousts are in pairs as in a tennis tournament. The king’s minter boxes his coins 100 to a box. In each box
See Problem 16 for tournament ladder. The 8 knights in he puts 1 false coin. The king suspects the minter and
the tournament are evenly matched, and they include the from each of 100 boxes draws a random coin and has it
twin knights Balin and Balan. What is the chance that the tested. What is the chance the minter’s peculations go
twins meet in a match during the tournament? undetected?
(b) Replace 8 by 2^n in the above problem. Now what is
the chance that they meet? 0.366

1/4,1/2^(n-1)

A bread salesman sells on the average 20 cakes on a

round of his route. What is the chance that he sells an
Pepys wrote Newton to ask which of three events is more even number of cakes?
likely: that a person get (a) at least 1 six when 6 dice are
rolled, (b) at least 2 sixes when 12 dice are rolled, or (c) at 1/2
least 3 sixes when 18 dice are rolled. What is the answer?
What is the least number of persons required if the
At least 1 six when 6 dice are rolled probability exceeds 1/2 that two or more of them have the
same birthday? (Year of birth need not match.)
A, B, and C are to fight a three-cornered pistol duel. All
know that A’s chance of hitting his target is 0.3, C’s is 0.5, 23
and B never misses. They are to fire at their choice of
target in succession in the order of A, B, C, cyclically (but You want to find someone whose birthday matches yours.
a hit man loses further turns and is no longer shot at) until What is the least number of strangers whose birthdays
only one man is left unhit. What should A’s strategy be? you need to ask about to have a 50-50 chance?

A does not shoot 253

In an election, two candidates, Albert, and Benjamin, If r persons compare birthdays in the pairings problem,
have in a ballot box a and b votes respectively, a > b, for the probability is PR that at least 2 have the same birthday.
What should n be in the personal birthmate problem to ace appears. On the average, how many cards are
make your probability success approximately PR? required to produce the first ace?

n=(r(r-1))/2 10.6th card

Labor laws in Erewhon require factory owners to give
every worker a holiday whenever one of them has a (a) A railroad numbers its locomotives in order, 1, 2, … , N.
birthday and to hire without discrimination on grounds of One day you see a locomotive and its number is 60. Guess
birthdays. Except for these holidays they work a 365-day how many locomotives the company has.
year. The owners want to maximize the expected total (b) You have looked at 5 locomotive and the largest
number of man-days worked per year in a factory. How number observed is 60. Again, guess how many
many workers do factories have in Erewhon? locomotives the company has.

364 119, 71

From where he stands, one step toward the cliff would (a) If a stick is broken in two at random, what is the average
send the drunken man over the edge. He takes random length of the smaller piece?
steps, either toward or away from the cliff. At any step his (b) What is the average ratio of the smaller length to the
probability of taking a step away is 2/3, if a step toward the larger?
cliff 1/3, What is his chance of escaping the cliff?
1/4, 0.386
4/7
A bar is broken at random in two places. Find the average
Player M has $1, and Player N has $2. Each play gives one size of the smallest, of the middle-sized, and the largest
of the players $1 from the other. Player M is enough better pieces.
than Player N that he wins 2/3 of the plays. They play until
one is bankrupt. What is the chance that Player M wins? 1/9, 5/18, 11/18

4/7
A game consists of a sequence of plays; on each play
At Las Vegas, a man with $20 needs $40, but he is too either you or your opponent scores a point, you with p
embarrassed to wire his wife for more money. He decides (less than 1/2), he with probability of 1-p. The number of
to invest in roulette (which he doesn’t enjoy playing) and plays is to be even – 2 or 4 or 6 and so on. To win the game
is considering two strategies: bet the $20 on “evens” all at you must get more than half the points. You know p, say
once and quit if he wins or loses or bet on “evens” one 0.45, and you get a prize if you win. You get to choose in
dollar at a time until he has won or lost $20. Compare the advance the number of plays. How many do you choose?
merits of the strategies.
10
$20 at once: 0.474
$1 at a time: 0.110 (a) From a shuffled deck, cards are laid out on a table one
at a time, face up from left to right, and then another deck
How thick should a coin be to have a 1/3 chance of is laid out so that each of its cards is beneath a card of
landing on edge? the first deck. What is the average number of matches of
the card above and the card below in repetitions of this
0.354r experiment?
(b) A typist types of letters and envelopes to n different
In a laboratory, each of a handful of thin 9-inch glass rods persons. The letters are randomly put into envelopes. On
had one tip marked with a blue dot and the other with a the average, how many letters are put into their own
red. When the laboratory assistant tripped and dropped envelopes?
them onto the concrete floor, many broke into three
pieces. For these, what was the average length of the 1, 1
fragment with the blue dot?
The king, to test a candidate for the position of wise man,
3 in offers him a chance to marry the young lady in the court
with the largest dowry. The amounts of the dowries are
Shuffle an ordinary deck of 52 playing cards containing written on slips of paper and mixed. A slip is drawn at
four aces. Then turn up cards from the top until the first random, and the wise man must decide whether that is
the largest dowry or not. If he decides it is, he gets the lady
and her dowry if he is correct; otherwise, he gets nothing.
If he decides against the amount written on the first slip,
he must choose or refuse the next slip, and so on until he
chooses one or else the slips are exhausted.
In all, 100 attractive young ladies participate, each with a
different dowry. How should the wise man make his
decision?

Pass 37 and take the first candidate thereafter

What is the probability that the quadratic equation

x^2+2bc+c=0 has real roots?

Starting from an origin 0, a particle has a 50-50 chance of

moving 1 step north, or 1 step south, and also a 50-50
chance of moving 1 step east or 1 step west. After the step
is taken, the move is repeated from the new position and
so on indefinitely. What is the chance that the particle
returns to the origin?

A particle starts at an origin 0 in three-space. Think of the

origin as centered in a cube 2 units on a side. One move
in this walk sends the particle with equal likelihood to one
of the eight corners of the cube. Thus, at every move the
particle has a 50-50 chance of moving one unit up or
down, one unit east or west, and one unit north or south.
If the walk continues forever, find the fraction of particles
that return to the origin.

0.239

A table of infinite expanse has inscribed on it a set of

parallel lines spaced 2a units apart. A needle of length 2l
(smaller than 2a) is twirled and tossed on the table. What
is the probability that when it comes to rest it crosses a
line?

2l/πa

Suppose we toss a needle of length 21 (less than I) on a

grid with both horizontal and vertical rulings spaced one
unit apart. What is the mean number of lines the needle
crosses?

4l/π